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Accession  No.  ^  Y^^  I       .    Class  No. 


A   MEMOIR 


OF 


ROBERT   C.  WINTHROP. 


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A   MEMOIR 


OF 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP. 


PREPABED  FOB 


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BY 


ROBERT  C.  WINTHROP,  JR. 


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BOSTON: 
LITTLE,  BROWN,  AND  COMPANY. 

1897. 


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^^^^' 


Off/ 

Copyright,  1897, 
By  John  Wilson  and  Son. 


Univeksitt  Press: 
John  Wilson  and  Son,  Cambridge,  U.S.A. 


PREFATOKY  NOTE. 


Hon.  Robert  C.  Winthrop  died  in  Boston,  Novem- 
ber 16,  1894,  in  his  eighty-sixth  year.  The  Massachu- 
setts Historical  Society  —  over  which  he  had  formerly 
presided  for  thirty  years,  and  of  which  he  had  been  a 
member  more  than  half  a  century  —  soon  after  printed 
and  circulated  the  tributes  then  paid  to  him  by  leading 
members,  and,  in  accordance  with  usage,  appointed  one 
of  their  associates  to  prepare  a  memoir.  This  duty  fell 
upon  the  undersigned,  and  the  reason  the  performance 
of  it  has  been  so  long  delayed,  in  conformity  to  Mr. 
Winthrop' s  wishes,  is  explained  in  the  following  pages. 
For  the  present  volume  the  Society  is  in  no  way  respon- 
sible. The  memoir  is  issued  in  a  separate  form  for  con- 
venient reference  and  for  distribution  among  leading 
public  libraries  and  the  libraries  of  learned  institutions. 
Any  such  libraries  which  do  not  receive  it  may,  if  they 
so  desire,  communicate  with  the  undersigned. 

Several  engravings  of  Mr.  Winthrop  —  none  of  them 
wholly  satisfactory — have  from  time  to  time  appeared  in 
different  publications.  Instead  of  furnishing  one  which 
has  been  used  before,  the  experiment  has  been  tried  of 
reproducing  likenesses  of  him  taken  at  widely  separated 
periods  of  his  life,  and  which  possess,  at  least,  the  merit 


yi  PREFATORY   NOTE. 

of  novelty.  The  earliest  is  from  a  medallion  by  Ball 
Hughes  in  1841,  the  latest  is  from  a  snap-shot,  in  his 
study  at  Brookline,  in  1891.  The  two  which  serve  as 
a  frontispiece  represent  him  at  the  respective  ages  of 
forty-five  and  seventy. 

It  may  be  well  to  add  that  the  letters  from  which  ex- 
tracts are  given  were  written  by  him  either  to  intimate 
friends  or  to  near  relatives,  but  it  has  not  been  thought 
worth  while  to  take  up  space  by  specifying  the  name 
of  the  person  to   whom   each  particular  passage  was 

addressed. 

ROBERT  C.  WINTHROP,   Jr. 

10  Walnut  Street,  Boston. 
September,  1897. 


MEMOIR. 


DOUBTS  have  been  repeatedly  expressed  with  re- 
gard to  the  wisdom  of  that  rule  of  this  Society 
which  exacts  a  memoir  of  a  deceased  member  from  one 
of  his  associates.  In  a  body  numbering  never  more 
than  one  hundred,  and  often  -less,  it  is  sometimes  diffi- 
cult to  procure  such  service,  and  the  most  suitable 
person  to  perform  it  is  not  always  within  our  ranks. 
It  seemed  to  Mr.  Winthrop  eminently  fitting  that  at 
some  meeting  following  the  death  of  a  member  there 
should  be  appropriate  recognition  of  his  career  and 
character,  but  he  considered  that  anything  of  the 
nature  of  formal  biography  should  be  governed  by  cir- 
cumstances and  not  obligatory.  Such  a  duty  is  some- 
times welcome.  It  was  so  to  him  when  he  wrote  for  us 
with  signal  success  the  memoirs  of  two  of  his  most 
cherished  friends,  Nathan  Appleton  and  John  Henry 
Clifford,  or  when  he  prepared  for  a  kindred  Society  one 
of  the  most  notable  of  his  commemorative  productions, 
his  memoir  of  Henry  Clay.  He  was,  moreover,  of 
opinion  that  memoirs  prepared  for  a  historical  so- 
ciety should  carry  with  them  an  air  of  deliberation, 
and  that  a  considerable  interval  should  ordinarily 
elapse  between  eulogies  printed  at  the  time  of  a  mem- 
ber's death  and  the  publication  of  a  detailed  narrative 

1 


2  A   MEMOIR   OF 

of  his  life.  Without  seeking  to  impose  his  views  upon 
others,  he  specified  with  distinctness  the  course  to  be 
pursued  in  his  own  case.  Aware  that  the  leading 
events  of  his  career  were  easily  accessible  in  works 
of  reference,^  foreseeing  that  he  would  not  merely  be- 
come the  subject  of  obituary  notices  in  the  newspaper 
press  throughout  the  country,^  but  that  one  or  more  of 
the  institutions  with  which  he  had  been  actively  associ- 
ated would  distribute  tributes  to  him  in  pamphlet  form,^ 
he  preferred  that  anything  farther  in  the  way  of  bio- 
graphical commemoration  should  be  postponed.  In 
looking  back  over  his  exceptionally  long  life  he  felt 
that  he  had  received,  on  the  whole,  ample  recognition 
of  any  services  he  might  have  rendered  to  the  causes  of 
religion  and  philanthropy,  or  in  the  fields  of  history 
and  oratory.  As  a  statesman,  however,  he  considered 
that  he  had  not  always  been  fully  understood  or  fairly 
represented,  though  he  realized  that  the  inaccuracies  of 
which  he  sometimes  complained  were  the  inevitable 
result  of  party  conflicts,  the  details  of  which  had  been 
imperfectly  appreciated  by  later  writers.  During  a 
political  career  which  began  as  far  back  as  1833,  he  had 
accumulated  a  mass  of  correspondence  with  public  men, 
selections  from  which,  if  properly  annotated,  could  hardly 

^  The  account  of  him  in  Appleton's  Dictionary  of  American  Biog- 
raphy is  the  most  accurate,  as  far  as  it  goes. 

2  Nearly  five  hundred  such  notices,  none  of  them  duplicates,  were 
collected  for  the  writer  by  news-agents. 

^  The  most  important  of  these  separate  tributes  may  also  be  found  in 
the  published  Proceedings  of  this  Society  and  in  those  of  the  Peabody 
Trustees.  Others  may  be  met  with,  either  in  the  annual  reports  of 
learned,  charitable,  educational,  and  religious  institutions,  or  in  the  kind 
words  of  personal  friends,  which  found  their  way  into  print  in  various 
forms. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  3 

fail,  he  believed,  to  interest  and  edify  future  students  of 
New  England  history,  but  he  had  no  desire  that  they 
should  be  printed  for  a  long  time  to  come.  His  per- 
sonal relations  with  some  of  the  bitterest  of  his 
opponents  grew  amicable  in  after  years ;  and  as  it  had 
become  his  lot  to  survive  both  friends  and  foes,  he  pre- 
ferred that  his  departure  should  not  be  signalized  by 
any  unnecessary  stirring  of  the  embers  of  by-gone  con- 
troversies. For  the  customary  memoir  for  this  Society 
it  would,  in  his  judgment,  suffice  to  furnish  a  succinct 
narrative  of  facts  and  dates  for  reference,  containing 
comparatively  little  of  personal  vindication,  and  still 
less  of  glowing  panegyric.  At  different  periods  he 
had  prepared  a  variety  of  autobiographical  material, 
which  he  never  found  leisure  to  arrange  or  complete. 
Portions  of  it  he  from  time  to  time  made  use  of  in 
his  various  productions.  Another  portion,  consisting  of 
reminiscences  of  European  celebrities  with  whom  he  had 
been  well  acquainted,  he  condensed  and  privately  printed 
not  long  before  his  death.  What  remains  has  been 
drawn  upon  when  necessary  in  these  pages,  and  may 
one  day  prove  of  value  in  editing  his  correspondence. 


Of  his  ancestry  it  is  enough  to  say  that  the  great 
Puritan  leader.  Governor  John  Winthrop  of  Massachu- 
setts, had  seven  sons  who  lived  to  manhood,  six  of 
whom  left  issue ;  but  the  male  lines  of  the  five  younger 
ones  having  gradually  become  extinct,  all  descendants 
of  the  Governor  bearing  the  name  of  Winthrop  now 


4  A  MEMOIR  OF 

spring  from  his  eldest  son,  John  Winthrop  the  younger, 
who,  after  having  helped  to  found  the  Massachusetts 
Colony,  was  long  Governor  of  Connecticut,  an  early 
Fellow  of  the  Royal  Society,  and  one  of  the  most 
accomplished  scholars  of  his  time.  At  the  close  of  the 
Revolutionary  War  this  line  was  represented  by  six 
brothers,  three  of  whom  preferred  to  live  chiefly  in  New 
York,  one  settled  in  South  Carolina,  another  cast  in  his 
lot  with  the  mother  country,  while  one  only  saw  fit  to 
maintain  the  hereditary  connection  of  his  family  with 
Boston,  where  he  lived  and  died.  This  was  Thomas 
Lindall  Winthrop,  for  many  years  Lieutenant-Governor 
of  this  State  and  President  of  this  Society,  who  married 
Elizabeth  Bowdoin,  daughter  of  Sir  John  Temple,  and 
granddaughter  of  Governor  James  Bowdoin  of  Revolu- 
tionary memory.^  The  Marquis  de  Chastellux,  in  his 
"  Travels  in  North  America,"  in  1782,  alludes  to  the 
beauty  of  this  lady  when  a  girl.  A  portrait  by  Gilbert 
Stuart  gives  some  idea  of  the  dignity  and  grace  of 
her  maturer  years,  while  her  son  Robert  bore  lifelong 
testimony  to  her  devotion  to  her  family  and  earnest, 
unaffected  Christian  faith.  She  died  in  her  fifty-first 
year,  in  1825,  having  had  fourteen  children,  of  whom 
the  subject  of  this  memoir  was  the  youngest ;  but  he 
survived  his  brothers  and  sisters  for  so  long  a  period 
that  in  his  old  age  few  people  remembered  that  he  ever 
had  any.  It  may  therefore  be  well  to  mention,  with- 
out naming  them  all,  that  his  eldest  brother,  Thomas, 
had  before  his  early  death  been  in  the  U.  S.  Diplomatic 

1  For  a  memoir  of  Hon.  Thomas  L.  Winthrop,  see  the  third  volume 
of  the  Transactions  cff  the  American  Antiquarian  Society,  of  which  he 
was  also  President.  A  shorter  one  is  in  the  second  volume  of  the  Fourth 
Series  of  our  own  Collections. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  5 

Service ;  the  next,  James  (who  took  the  name  of  Bow- 
doin),  was  an  antiquarian,  and  an  active  member  of  this 
Society ;  the  third,  Wilham,  first  scholar  of  his  class  at 
Harvard,  at  the  time  of  his  death  was  studying  for  the 
ministry ;  two  others,  John  and  Grenville,  were  mem- 
bers of  the  Bar  and  of  the  Massachusetts  Legislature, 
besides  successively  commanding  the  Suffolk  brigade  of 
militia;  their  married  sisters  having  been  Elizabeth, 
wife  of  Rev.  Benjamin  Tappan,  D.  D. ;  Sarah,  wife  of 
Hon.  George  Sullivan;  Augusta,  wife  of  John  Smyth 
Rogers  of  New  York;  and  Anne,  second  wife  of  Dr. 
John  C.  Warren. 

Robert  Charles  Winthrop  was  born  in  Milk  Street, 
Boston,  May  12,  1809,  in  the  house  of  his  great-uncle, 
Hon.  James  Bowdoin,  then  U.  S.  Minister  to  Spain  and 
Associate  Minister  to  France.^  His  mother  was  his 
only  teacher  until  he  was  nearly  seven,  after  which  he 
successively  attended  two  private  schools,  the  first  kept 
by  the  estimable  Deacon  Samuel  Greele  in  what  was 
then  called  Pond  Street,  the  second  by  an  Englishman, 
John  Carlton  Fisher,  who  had  been  an  usher  at  a  public 
school  in  his  own  country,  and  to  whom  Mr.  Winthrop 
was  always  grateful  for  having  instilled  into  him  that 
love  of  classical  scholarship  —  more  particularly  of  the 
Latin  poets  —  which  proved  one  of   the  most   endur- 

1  For  many  years  after  his  marriage  in  1786,  Hon.  T.  L.  Winthrop 
occupied  a  large  house,  till  recently  standing  though  much  degraded,  on 
the  corner  of  Sudbury  Street  and  Alden  Court.  A  reverse  of  fortune 
broke  up  this  establishment,  when  the  Milk  Street  house  was  loaned  to 
him,  but  on  the  return  of  Mr.  Bowdoin  from  Europe  his  nephew  removed 
to  No.  2  Hamilton  Place,  which  then  overlooked  the  Common.  Later, 
in  1824,  he  purchased  and  much  enlarged  a  house  still  standing  on  the 
lower  corner  of  Beacon  and  Walnut  streets,  where  he  lived  until  his 
death  in  1841. 


6  A  MEMOIR  OF 

ing  pleasures  of  his  life.  As  Dr.  Fisher  confined  his 
instruction  to  the  ancient  languages,  Mr.  Winthrop  at 
the  same  time  studied  other  branches,  first  with  a 
young  William  Apthorp,  but  longer  with  Warren  Col- 
burn,  afterward  a  well-known  mathematician.  His  final 
preparation  for  College  was  at  the  Boston  Latin  School, 
the  head-master  of  which  was  then  the  much  respected 
Benjamin  Ap thorp  Gould,  of  whom  Mr.  Winthrop  was 
the  favorite  pupil.  More  than  all  the  prizes  of  his 
school  and  college  days  he  valued  two  sets  of  volumes 
which  came  to  him  unexpectedly  at  this  period.  One 
was  Murray's  edition  of  the  works  of  Washington 
Irving,  a  parting  personal  gift  from  Master  Gould, 
inscribed  on  the  fly-leaf,  "Roberto  Carolo  Winthrop, 
juveni  ingenuo,  omnibus  caro,  ac  omne  laude  digno,  hoc 
parvulum  amoris  pignus  atque  diligentiae  urbanitatis- 
que  praemium,  datum  est  ab  amico  et  tutore  B.  A.  G. 
Scholoe  LatinaB  Bostoniensis,  A.  D.  MDCCCXXIV."  The 
other  was  a  fine  edition  of  Sophocles,  presented  to  him 
publicly,  with  some  very  complimentary  expressions,  by 
Mayor  Quincy  on  the  platform  of  Faneuil  Hall  before 
the  dinner  to  the  Franklin  Medal  scholars,  and  inscribed, 
"  Scholge  Latinae  Filio  Digno  Roberto  C.  Winthrop,  ab 
Urbe,  pro  meritis  datum.     MDCCCXXIY." 

Although  prepared  to  pass  the  entrance  examination 
for  Harvard  at  the  age  of  fourteen,  he  had  waited  a 
year  by  his  father's  desire  in  order  not  to  precede  an 
elder  brother  less  studious  than  himself;  but  he  now 
took  up  his  residence  in  Cambridge,  which  he  left  in 
1828  with  the  third  honors  of  a  class  whose  foremost 
scholar  was  his  chum,  the  short-lived  Charles  Chauncy 
Emerson,  younger  brother  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson, 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  7 

and,  in  the  opinion  of  many  of  his  contemporaries,  a 
man  of  stronger  intellect.  In  mathematics  Mr.  Win- 
throp  excelled  all  his  classmates,  who  elected  him  their 
President,  but,  as  Professor  Channing  told  him,  he 
"  did  too  many  things  "  to  be  within  reach  of  a  First 
Part.  He  commanded  the  military  company  of  the 
College,  the  famous  but  long  extinct  "  Harvard  Wash- 
ington Corps."  He  presided  over  the  select  convivial 
reunions  of  the  Porcellian  Club  and  the  Knights  of  the 
Square  Table.  He  was  Orator  of  the  Hasty  Pudding 
Club,  was  alike  enrolled  among  the  notorious  Med. 
Fac.  and  the  exemplary  Phi  Beta  Kappa ;  sang  bass  in 
the  Chapel  choir,  played  a  subordinate  musical  in- 
strument in  the  concerts  of  the  Pierian  Sodality,  and 
not  infrequently  stole  away  to  town  (quite  a  little 
journey  in  those  days)  to  attend  some  theatrical  per- 
formance or  social  gathering.  The  only  wonder  was 
that  with  all  this  he  managed  to  secure  the  Third 
Part,  which  he  signalized  by  a  Commencement  oration 
entitled  "  Public  Station."  ^  Immediately  after  the 
exercises  Hon.  T.  L.  Winthrop  gave  in  his  son's  honor, 
at  Porter's  Tavern,  a  large  reception,  which  was  at- 
tended by  John  Quincy  Adams,  then  President,  and 
other  persons  of  distinction,  but  Andrew  Stevenson, 
Speaker  of  the  U.  S.  House  of  Kepresentatives,  was 
conspicuous  by  his  absence,  though  he  had  expressed 
an  intention  of  coming  and  had  been  seen  among  the 
audience.  It  turned  out,  drolly  enough,  that  he  had 
taken  umbrage  at  a  passage  in  Mr.  Winthrop' s  oration, 

1  This  production,  which  attracted  favorable  notice  at  the  time  of  its 
delivery,  was  never  considered  by  its  author  worthy  of  a  place  in  his 
collected  works,  but  is  to  be  found  in  the  late  R.  G.  Parker's  "  Aids  to 
English  Composition." 


8  A  MEMOIR  OF 

where,  quoting  from  the  Psalms  of  David,  "  promotion  " 
had  been  described  as  coming  "  neither  from  the  East, 
nor  from  the  West,  nor  yet  from  the  South."  The 
Virginia  statesman,  perhaps  half  asleep  and  probably 
more  familiar  with  politics  than  Holy  Writ,  had  got 
it  into  his  head  that  this  was  intended  as  a  compliment 
to  President  Adams  and  the  North,  in  disparagement 
of  other  sections  of  the  Union. 

I  find  but  five  letters  written  to  Mr.  Winthrop  at  this 
period  by  college  friends.  Three  of  them  are  little  notes 
from  Charles  Emerson;  the  fourth  is  an  entertaining 
account  of  a  night  passed  in  a  Methodist  camp  meeting 
on  Cape  Cod,  by  Thomas  Kemper  Davis;  the  fifth  a 
scrap  which  I  insert  here  only  because  the  writer,  with 
other  titles  to  remembrance,  became  a  valued  Recording 
Secretary  of  this  Society. 

Deaely  Beloved,  —  As  touching  the  points  of  faith  and 
conduct  whereof  you  have  enquired  of  me,  it  has  seemed 
good  to  me  to  vouchsafe  the  following  reply.  As  to  the 
time  when,  good.  As  to  the  place  where,  very  excellent 
good.  As  to  the  quantity,  half  a  dozen.  As  to  the  brand, 
Forrest  Rheims.  As  to  the  place  from  which,  Parker  and 
Codman's.  And  now,  most  excellent  Theophilus,  having 
resolved  thy  doubts  and  confirmed  thy  faith,  I  commend  me 
to  thee  and  commend  thee. 

Edmund,  to  my  brothers  and  sisters, 

Quince,  to  my  familiars, 
and  Ed:mund  Quincy,  Esquire,  to  all  Europe. 

Having  thus  obtained  a  bachelor's  degree  at  the  age 
of  nineteen,  he  soon  after  entered  the  law-office  of 
Daniel  Webster,  where  his  fellow-student  was  his  friend 
Davis,  and  where  he  remained  until  his  admission  to  the 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  9 

Suffolk  Bar  in  1831.  Webster  was  then  Senator  from 
Massachusetts  and  necessarily  much  in  Washington,  the 
local  business  being  attended  to  by  his  junior  partner. 
Even  when  at  home  he  was  generally  too  busy  to  give 
much  attention  to  his  students,  whose  duties  were  to 
copy  papers,  look  up  cases,  and  prepare  briefs ;  but  he 
repeatedly  complimented  them  on  their  diligence  and 
on  one  occasion  magnanimously  assured  them  that  he 
had  won  a  case  in  the  United  States  Supreme  Court 
with  a  brief  prepared  by  them,  which  he  had  only  found 
time  to  read  at  the  last  moment.  At  very  long  inter- 
vals he  discoursed  a  little  on  the  great  principles  of 
jurisprudence,  more  often  favored  them  with  a  passing 
insight  into  contemporary  politics,  but  whatever  he 
touched  upon  was  always  interesting  and  impressive. 
To  Mr.  Winthrop,  who  had  listened  with  enthusiasm  to 
Webster's  address  on  Bunker  Hill  in  1825  and  to  his 
immortal  eulogy  on  Adams  and  Jefferson  in  the  follow- 
ing year,  conceiving  thereby  a  profound  admiration  for 
his  intellect  and  oratory,  this  daily  association  with  that 
illustrious  man  during  a  large  part  of  three  successive 
years  was  a  source  of  unmixed  pleasure.  He  cannot, 
however,  be  said  to  have  consumed  any  appreciable 
amount  of  midnight  oil  in  that  unwearying  study  of  the 
law  which  has  characterized  so  many  of  its  votaries. 
After  dark  and  even  before  dark  he  cultivated  fashion- 
able society  with  some  degree  of  assiduity,  became  a 
manager  of  subscription-balls,  wore  some  of  the  most 
conspicuous  of  the  party-colored  waistcoats  then  in 
vogue,  and,  according  to  one  of  his  sisters,  devoted  an 
unconscionable  time  to  the  art  of  tying  voluminous 
cravats.     He  exhibited,  too,  a  martial  ardor  on  receiv- 


10  A  MEMOIR  OF 

ing  a  commission  in  the  State  Militia,  serving  first  as 
ensign  and  then  as  lieutenant  in  the  Boston  Light 
Infantry,  familiarly  known  as  "  Tigers,"  a  corps  which 
he  soon  after  commanded.  He  contributed  now  and 
then  to  periodical  literature,  the  first  sum  of  money  he 
ever  earned  having  been  eight  dollars  (at  the  regular 
compensation  of  one  dollar  a  page)  for  an  article  on 
"  American  Annals  "  in  the  "  North  American  Eeview ; " 
but  a  previous  article  on  "  Temperance  Pledges,"  in  the 
"  New  England  Magazine,"  not  only  elicited  no  pay  at  all, 
but  became  the  subject  of  some  animadversion  from  tee- 
totalers. When  the  time  came  for  putting  up  a  sign  in 
Court  Street,  as  was  the  custom  of  young  counsellors 
in  those  days,  he  met  with  the  average  success  of  a 
beginner,  but  did  not  regret  being  soon  drawn  into 
politics;  and  though  he  kept  his  office  open  until  he 
entered  Congress,  it  grew  more  and  more  to  be  fre- 
quented by  place-hunters  than  by  clients.  For  a  part  of 
the  time,  moreover,  his  attention  was  distracted  from 
other  pursuits  by  an  attachment  which  resulted  in  his 
marriage,  March  12,  1832,  to  Eliza,  only  child  of 
Francis  Blanchard  of  Boston  by  his  wife  Mary  Anne 
Cabot,  mother  by  a  former  marriage  of  the  late  John 
Clarke  Lee  of  Salem.  Mrs.  Winthrop,  a  young  woman 
of  marked  personal  attractions  and  great  vivacity,  hav- 
ing lost  both  her  parents  in  early  childhood,  had  been 
brought  up  in  the  family  of  her  great-uncle  and  guar- 
dian, Samuel  Pickering  Gardner,  a  former  member  of 
this  Society  and  one  of  the  best  of  men,  to  whose  widow 
(Rebecca  Russell  Lowell)  many  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  enter- 
taining descriptions  of  Congressional  life  were  subse- 
quently addressed.     The  happy  pair  devoted  much  of 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  11 

their  honeymoon  to  a  trip  to  Maryland  and  Virginia, 
where  they  were  received  with  true  Southern  hospi- 
tality, among  the  houses  at  which  they  were  successively 
the  guests  for  one  or  more  days  having  been  those  of 
two  exceptionally  distinguished  statesmen,  James  Madi- 
son and  James  Barbour,  both  great  talkers  and  full  of 
the  most  interesting  reminiscences.  "  You  see  us,"  said 
the  ex-President  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  "surrounded  by 
negroes.  They  are  eating  us  out  of  house  and  home, 
and  gladly  would  I  emancipate  them,  but  I  cannot 
make  up  my  mind  to  what  would  be  a  cruelty.  They 
are  utterly  helpless  but  for  us,  and  they  are  as  much 
attached  to  the  homestead  as  we  are.  I  cannot  drive 
them  from  our  doors  unprovided  for,  and  there  seems 
no  practicable  mode  of  securing  them  from  want  in  a 
state  of  freedom."  Pursuing  the  topic,  he  added,  "I 
am  beginning  to  hope,  however,  that  slavery  will  in 
some  way  come  to  an  end  at  no  very  distant  day.  The 
debates  in  our  State  Convention  of  1830  were  full  of 
encouragement,  exhibiting  a  revolution  in  opinion  on 
this  subject  hardly  second  in  importance  to  anything 
which  had  occurred  since  the  Revolution  of  1776. 
These  debates  gave  me  the  first  confident  hope  that 
domestic  slavery  in  this  country  would  not  be  eternal." 
In  Washington  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Winthrop  came  into  con- 
tact with  the  actual  President,  Andrew  Jackson,  a  very 
different  type  of  ruler,  and  in  Baltimore  they  had  a 
touching  interview  with  Charles  Carroll,  last  survivor  of 
the  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  then 
ninety-five  years  old. 

The  accident  of  Henry  Clay's  decision  to  visit  Boston 
in  the  autumn  of  1833  first  drew  marked  attention  to 


12  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Mr.  Winthrop's  gifts  as  a  public  speaker.  Clay  had 
been  an  unsuccessful  candidate  for  the  Presidency  in 
the  preceding  year;  but  neither  this  defeat,  nor  his 
more  recent  differences  with  Webster  on  the  subject  of 
the  Tariff,  had  cooled  the  ardor  of  his  Boston  follow- 
ers, the  younger  portion  of  whom  arranged  a  special 
demonstration  in  his  honor.  Mr.  Winthrop  was  made 
chairman  of  a  committee  to  escort  him  to  his  hotel, 
where  he  made  him  an  address  of  welcome  and,  before 
his  departure,  presided  at  a  banquet  at  which  the  guest 
of  the  evening  was  presented  with  a  pair  of  silver 
pitchers.  The  felicity  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  utterances  on 
these  two  occasions  was  so  much  commented  on  that,  a 
few  weeks  later,  he  was  invited  to  make  the  principal 
address  at  Faneuil  Hall  at  a  caucus  of  the  anti-Jackson 
or  National  Republican  party  (soon  to  adopt  the  famous 
name  of  Whigs)  prior  to  the  State  election  for  Gov- 
ernor. Our  former  associate,  Hon.  William  Sullivan, 
author  of  the  "  Political  Class-Book "  and  "  Letters  on 
Public  Characters,''  was  among  his  audience  and  wrote 
a  friend  as  follows :  — 

"  I  rejoice  we  have  a  young  orator  to  keep  up  the  holy  flame 
of  old  Faneuil  Hall.  I  may  be  allowed,  without  the  charge 
of  vanity,  to  consider  myself  a  judge  of  such  performances, 
and  I  consider  this  not  merely  a  good  speech  for  a  first  effort, 
but  one  which  any  practised  man  might  have  been  proud  to 
make.  It  was  pertinent  to  the  occasion ;  it  was  gentlemanly 
and  decorous  in  language ;  it  was  well  digested  and  regular 
in  order;  singularly  free  from  embarrassment  and  highly 
pleasing  in  manner."  ^ 

^  It  was  never  printed  in  full,  but  may  be  described  as  having 
coupled  an  effective  arraignment  of  Jackson's  policy  with  an  earnest 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  13 

Soon  after  appointed  to  the  staff  of  the  Governor 
elect,  John  Davis,  with  the  rank  of  lieutenant-colonel, 
he  also  became  a  member  of  the  State  Central  Committee 
of  his  party,  —  a  post  with  which  he  was  long  identified. 
Both  as  junior  member  and  subsequently  chairman  of 
this  influential  body,  his  colleagues  placed  so  much 
reliance  upon  his  pen  that  for  a  number  of  years  the 
Addresses  to  Electors  and  the  Resolutions  for  Conven- 
tions were  written  wholly  or  in  part  by  him.  Now  to 
be  found  only  in  the  form  of  rare  pamphlets,  or  in 
bound  volumes  of  newspapers,  they  are  well  worth 
the  careful  perusal  of  any  student  of  Massachusetts 
history.^  Having  in  the  spring  of  1834  been  placed  at 
the  head  of  a  committee  of  the  young  men  of  Boston  to 
memorialize  Congress  on  the  subject  of  the  removal  of 
the  government  deposits  from  the  Bank  of  the  United 
States,  Mr.  Winthrop  made  a  vigorous  speech  in  Faneuil 
Hall  in  opposition  to  the  Administration,  following  it 
up  by  others  in  different  places  during  the  ensuing 
twelve  months.  In  the  spring  of  1835,  the  Whig  mem- 
bers of  the  Legislature  having  nominated  Daniel  \Yebster 
for  the  Presidency,  he  actively  supported  that  nomina- 
tion by  an  effective  speech  at  Faneuil  Hall  at  the  outset, 
by  similar  speeches  there  and  elsewhere  during  the  Presi- 
dential campaign  of  1836,  and  by  the  preparation  of  a 
variety  of  printed  circulars  and  resolutions  on  the  same 

appeal  to  the  conservative  young  men  of  Massachusetts  to  give  more 
active  attention  to  their  political  interests  and  their  political  duties. 

1  It  was  the  custom  to  submit  them  to  the  approval  of  the  party- 
leaders,  and  on  some  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  private  copies  I  find  such 
pencilled  memoranda  as,  "  Webster  wrote  opening  paragraphs,  next 
mine,"  and  "  Webster  and  Everett  both  had  a  finger  in  this  pie,  but 
were  not  thought  to  have  much  improved  its  flavor." 


14  A  MEMOIR  OF 

subject,  including  the  greater  part  of  an  Address  to 
the  People  of  the  United  States,  written  for  a  public 
meeting  in  New  York  at  the  request  of  Hiram 
Ketchum.  These  campaign  speeches  of  Mr.  Winthrop, 
with  many  others  delivered  by  him  between  the  last- 
named  year  and  1840,  —  some  uttered  in  different 
parts  of  New  England,  some  in  New  York,  —  while 
they  were  rapturously  greeted  by  his  audiences  and 
much  lauded  by  newspapers  of  his  own  way  of  think- 
ing, were  very  imperfectly  reported.  As  most  of  them 
now  exist,  if  they  exist  at  all,  only  in  manuscript,  I 
quote  a  few  passages  from  those  just  mentioned  in 
order  to  give  some  idea  of  what  might  be  termed  his 
"early  manner." 

What,  sir,  has  been  the  course  of  the  President  ?  I  will 
not  trouble  this  meeting  with  a  detailed  statement  of  it,  but 
what  one  power  that  he  fairly  has,  has  he  not  abused,  and 
what  one  that  he  has  not,  has  he  not  usurped  or  grasped  at  ? 
Look  at  the  veto  power,  —  that  awful  attribute  of  kings,  but 
which  hardly  any  king  has  dared  to  wield  almost  within  the 
memory  of  man,  —  it  is  matter  of  record  that  it  has  directly 
or  indirectly  been  employed  by  our  present  Chief  Magistrate 
a  greater  number  of  times  than  in  all  the  other  years  since 
the  creation  of  the  Constitution.  Take,  too,  the  power  of  re- 
moval from  office,  —  a  merely  constructive  power  at  the  best, 
thrown  into  the  Executive  hand  by  the  mere  casting  vote  of 
a  Vice-President  in  the  early  days  of  our  government,  —  it  is 
ascertained  with  indisputable  accuracy  that  it  has  been  used 
by  our  present  Chief  Magistrate  to  the  full  of  three  times  as 
often  as  by  all  his  predecessors  put  together.  And  then, 
sir,  his  course  as  to  the  Bank.  .  .  .  There  are  some  deposits 
more  sacred  than  the  public  funds,  deposits  which  money 
cannot  pay  for,  which  gold  cannot  redeem,  —  certainly  not 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  15 

that  gold  which  has  been  shorn  of  the  badge  of  our  liberty 
and  the  motto  of  our  Union.  Liberty  and  the  Constitution 
which  secures  it,  what  are  these  but  sacred,  precious  deposits, 
intrusted  to  our  keeping  by  our  fathers  for  our  enjoyment 
and  that  of  our  posterity,  and  who  that  has  an  eye  to  tlie 
condition  of  his  country  can  fail  to  see  the  vulture  hand  of 
Andrew  Jackson  hanging  over  and  clutching  at  these  deposits  ? 
His  whole  career  has  clearly  manifested  the  tyrannous  design 
to  set  up  his  arbitrary  and  despotic  will  as  the  sole  standard 
of  government  and  to  make  himself  the  master  instead  of  the 
servant  of  the  American  people.  With  the  sanction  of  the 
party  by  whom  he  is  supported,  the  Constitution  has  been 
violated,  the  laws  have  been  trampled  on,  the  public  treasure 
has  been  seized,  the  judiciary  has  been  menaced,  the  people's 
interests  have  been  overlooked,  the  people's  rights  have  been 
overleaped,  the  people's  money  has  been  squandered,  and  the 
people's  will  has  been  defied ;  while  in  the  intimation  that  he 
is  to  be  supported  for  a  third  term  unless  some  supple  tool  of 
his  own  dictation  can  be  made  certain  of  success,  we  find  a 
new  manifestation  of  that  utter  disregard  which  he  has  all 
along  evinced  for  the  precepts  and  practice  of  our  immortal 
Washington,  and  of  all  the  other  great  and  good  men  who 
have  presided  over  the  Republic.  But  one  single  act  of  his 
whole  administration  have  the  people  of  Massachusetts  found 
it  in  their  consciences  to  approve.  But  one  ray  of  pure  and 
patriotic  light  has  gleamed  to  illumine  and  render  visible  the 
blackness  of  darkness  in  which  all  the  rest  has  been  envel- 
oped. And  even  this,  while  we  are  pronouncing  it  an  ema- 
nation of  patriotism,  flames  and  flickers  so  fitfully  that  we  are 
almost  constrained  to  regard  it  rather  as  the  baser  issue  of  sel- 
fish passion.  Who  doubts  that  but  for  the  fortunate  personal 
collision  between  Mr.  Calhoun  and  the  President,  Nullifica- 
tion in  South  Carolina  would  have  met  the  same  encourage- 
ment and  countenance  it  had  before  met  in  Georgia,  and 
would  have  been,  so  far  as  the  President  could  make  it,  the 
settled  construction  of  the  Constitution  ?  .  .  . 


16  A  MEMOIR  OF 

The  country  is  before  long  to  decide  whether  he  alone  shall 
descend  from  his  proud  elevation  while  the  sordid  slaves  of 
his  will,  the  slimy  spawn  of  his  creation,  still  cling  to  and  de- 
file it ;  or  whether  it  shall  be  wholly  and  at  once  purified  and 
become  again  the  source  of  a  rightful,  wholesome  authority, 
instead  of  the  sink  of  a  corrupt  and  arbitrary  misrule.  Shall 
the  long-expected  hour  display  to  us  the  mere  shifting  of 
masters,  or  shall  it  bring  about  the  substitution  of  a  good  old- 
fashioned  President  for  an  obstinate  and  despotic  Chief  ^^^ 
Shall  the  Capitol  in  that  day  be  likened  only  to  the  house  in 
that  sacred  parable  from  which  indeed  one  unclean  spirit  was 
cast  out,  but  into  which  seven  others  worse  than  himself 
otherwise  entered,  or  shall  the  whole  legion  be  at  once  ex- 
pelled and  extirpated  ?  Shall  that  change  be  a  mere  change 
from  one  degree  of  corruption  to  another,  or  shall  this  corrup- 
tion put  on  incorruption  and  our  liberties  be  again  restored  to 
a  sound,  healthy  constitutional  basis  ?  .  .  . 

No  one  who  prizes  the  great  principles  for  which  we  are 
contending  can  be  ignorant  who  has  been  their  most  able  and 
effective  assertor.  No  one  who  values  the  safety  of  the  Con- 
stitution or  has  trembled  at  the  perils  by  which  it  has  been 
environed,  can  have  failed  to  recognize  its  most  successful 
and  powerful  champion.  No  one  who  has  marked  with  dis- 
gust and  indignation  the  frequent  violations  of  liberty  and 
law  which  have  been  attempted  by  the  present  administration, 
can  have  been  deaf  to  the  voice  of  thunder  which  has  rebuked, 
confronted,  and  driven  them  back.  It  is  not  as  the  most  dis- 
tinguished son  of  Massachusetts,  it  is  not  merely  as  a  great 
man  —  the  world  over,  a  great  man  —  that  he  has  been  se- 
lected as  our  candidate.  We  are  not  called  upon  as  the 
Webster  party,  bent  upon  the  elevation  of  an  individual 
person,  nor  as  a  Northern  party,  seeking  the  gratification  of  a 
sectional  prejudice.  But  we  are  called  upon  in  the  simple 
faith  of  the  Constitution,  in  the  unmingled  love  of  our  Re- 
publican Union,  to  select  and  support  for  its  highest  post  him 
^  Jackson's  admirers  liked  to  call  him  "  the  old  chief." 


EGBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  17 

whom  we  believe  most  able  to  bear  up  its  destinies  and  most 
faithful  to  discharge  its  duties.  We  are  told,  over  and  over 
again  told,  that  his  name  awakens  little  enthusiasm  outside 
of  New  England,  that  we  cannot  elect  him,  and  that  we  are 
throwing  away  our  votes.  I  should  be  the  last  person  to 
assert  that  to  his  other  elements  of  greatness  Mr.  Webster 
unites  that  fascinating  address,  that  wonderful  personal  mag- 
netism, which  have  made  another  of  our  leaders  an  idol  of  the 
masses  throughout  the  country.  But,  sir,  Henry  Clay  is  not 
now  in  question,  and  if  Webster  cannot  be  elected  no  Whig 
can  be.  An  appeal,  then,  to  abandon  our  candidate  is  an 
appeal  to  abandon  our  cause,  and  to  let  slip  a  most  fitting 
opportunity  of  placing  on  record  our  profound  conviction  that 
the  highest  honors  of  the  Constitution  should  be  awarded  to 
its  ablest  defender.  A  vote  thrown  for  a  bad  man,  a  vote 
thrown  for  a  bad  measure,  a  vote  thrown  for  a  false  principle, 
however  it  may  be  found  on  the  side  of  a  majority,  is  a  vote 
thrown  away,  —  away  from  the  purpose  for  which  it  was 
intrusted,  away  from  duty,  away  from  liberty.  But  a  vote 
thrown  in  support  of  Constitutional  principles  and  in  favor 
of  one  who  has  devoted  his  whole  life  and  his  unequalled 
abilities  to  their  defence,  though  it  may  fail  of  its  effect  and 
fall  dead  in  the  ballot-box,  is  still  nobly,  gloriously  thrown,  — 
thrown  in  strict  accordance  with  the  first  principles  of  the 
elective  franchise  and  in  the  direct  line  of  political  and  moral 
duty.  .  .  . 

I  am  not  afraid  to  look  defeat  in  the  face,  for  there  is,  it 
cannot  be  denied,  a  gleam  of  sunshine  on  the  horizon.  The 
gorgon  head  of  Andrew  Jackson  is  no  longer  in  the  field 
against  us.  The  smoke  of  that  New  Orleans  victory  will  no 
longer  blear  and  blind  the  eyes  of  the  American  people.  The 
magic  of  that  word  Hero  will  no  longer  silence  the  tones  of 
patriotic  opposition.  The  spell  is  already  broken,  the  charm 
dissolves  apace,  the  bonds  of  that  fatal  destiny  are  scattered, 
the  people  are  awaking.    .    .    . 

Tell  me  not  there  is  hope  that  the  Baltimore  candidate, 

2 


18  A  MEMOIR   OF 

when  once  installed  in  the  White  House,  when  he  has  reached 
the  topmost  round  of  his  young  ambition,  will  scorn  the  base 
degrees  by  which  he  did  ascend  and  redeem  himself  from  the 
dominion  of  the  infamous  cabal  by  which  he  has  been  boosted. 
Such  a  hope  might  have  been  stated  with  some  degree  of 
plausibility  while  he  stood  wrapped  in  the  dark  cloak  of  that 
cherished  non-committal  policy  which  was  so  long  his  only 
wear.  It  was  easy  then  to  predicate  anything  of  him  which 
suited  his  purpose  or  ours,  and  difficult  to  prove  anything 
against  him  but  political  intrigue  and  cunning.  But  the  fox 
has  at  last  been  beaten  from  his  hole,  —  we  have  seen  his 
teeth,  —  and  we  have  seen  that,  like  Samson's  foxes,  he  has  a 
firebrand  at  his  tail  which  threatens  to  burn  every  green  thing 
which  is  left  in  the  garden  of  our  Liberty.  He  has  been  com- 
pelled to  give  in  evidence  even  to  the  very  teeth  and  fore- 
head of  his  faults.  His  opinions,  his  intentions  if  elected, 
are  now  on  record,  and  he  stands  pledged  by  his  own  sig- 
nature not  to  recede  from  the  arrogant  pretensions,  not  to 
renounce  the  despotic  doctrines,  of  his  predecessor,  —  not  to 
relax  the  latter's  iron  grasp  nor  cease  from  perverting  all  the 
power  and  patronage  of  office  to  personal  and  political  aggran- 
dizement, —  but  to  follow  in  his  footsteps  and  perpetuate  his 
policy  !  Why,  sir,  of  what  stuff  must  that  man's  conscience 
be  made,  of  what  consistency  must  be  his  principles,  of  what 
chameleon  color,  of  what  Protean  shape,  of  what  serpentine 
stability  his  mental  and  moral  system,  who  can  call  Daniel 
Webster  his  first  choice  for  President  and  Martin  Van  Buren 
his  second?  Not  until  the  whole  catalogue  of  political  cut- 
purses  has  been  exhausted,  not  at  least  until  the  chair  of 
State  stands  empty  and  the  Constitution  must  fail  unless  he 
fill  it,  should  Van  Buren  be  anything  but  the  last  choice  of 
any  honest  Whig.  It  is  idle  to  talk  of  his  being  a  Northern 
man,  who  will  befriend  Northern  interests  and  Northern 
policy.  As  I  turned  over  my  psalm-book  this  morning  I 
met  with  two  lines  which  I  adopt  as  my  motto  upon  this 
point :  — 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  19 

*No  policy  shall  recommend 
His  country's  foe  to  be  my  friend.* 

Not  till  the  conviction  that  Martin  Van  Buren,  pledged  as 
he  is  to  perpetuate  the  system  of  the  present  Administration, 
is  a  foe,  not  to  the  South  or  North,  or  East  or  West  only,  but 
to  the  whole  country  and  its  Constitution,  is  eradicated  from 
the  very  fibres  of  my  heart,  could  I  assent  to  his  receiving 
one  Whig  vote.  If  we  join  with  anybody,  let  it  be  with  our 
friends  and  not  our  enemies.  And  while  we  shall  not  part 
with  our  own  candidate  nor  admit  an  equal  claim  to  our  sup- 
port in  another,  we  may  go  with  him  and  he  will  go  with  us 
to  the  rescue  of  the  Constitution  at  any  personal  sacrifice. 
We  hail  therefore  the  triumph  of  our  Western  friends  with 
unfeigned  pleasure  and  desire  no  better  auspices  under  which 
to  go  into  our  own  contest.^ 

In  the  State  election  of  1834  Mr.  Winthrop  had  been 
elected  a  representative  from  Boston  to  the  General 
Court,  where  he  served  six  years,  the  last  three  of  them 
as  Speaker.  The  Massachusetts  House  of  Representa- 
tives was  then  a  body  of  more  than  five  hundred  mem- 
bers, over  whom  it  was  no  light  task  to  preside,  but 
Mr.  Winthrop  had  a  natural  aptitude  for  duties  the 
successful  discharge  of  which  added  largely  to  his  repu- 
tation, and  he  made  an  exhaustive  study  of  parliament- 
ary law,  which  stood  him  in  good  stead  when  called 
upon  at  a  later  day  to  perform  similar  functions  in  a 
national  arena.  During  this  period  of  legislative  service 
in  his  own  Commonwealth  his  first  important  speech 
was  in  favor  of  compensation  for  the  destruction  of  the 

^  In  1836  there  were  four  candidates  for  the  Presidency :  Martin  Van 
Buren  of  New  York,  William  Henry  Harrison  of  Ohio,  Hugh  L.  White 
of  Tennessee,  and  Daniel  Webster  of  Massachusetts.  The  allusion  in 
the  above  paragraph  is  to  the  supporters  of  General  Harrison. 


20  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Ursuline  Convent  by  a  mob.  It  was  succeeded  at  inter- 
vals by  elaborate  speeches  entitled,  The  Testimony  of 
Infidels,  Protection  to  Domestic  Industry,  The  Sub- 
Treasury  System,  and  The  Votes  of  Interested  Mem- 
bers; but  they  need  not  be  further  described  here,  as 
they  are  to  be  found  in  the  first  volume  of  his  collected 
works.  A  lecture  by  him  in  Boston,  in  1838,  on  Free 
Schools  and  Free  Governments,  was  the  first  of  a  long 
series  of  non-political  productions,  prepared  by  him  at 
intervals  between  that  time  and  his  old  age,  which  soon 
made  him  a  peculiar  favorite  on  commemorative  occa- 
sions. It  was  followed  by  an  address  on  the  Pilgrim 
Fathers,  delivered  before  the  New  England  Society  of 
New  York,  in  1839,  and  which  is  interesting  to  compare 
with  his  celebrated  oration  at  Plymouth,  in  1870,  on 
the  Two  Hundred  and  Fiftieth  Anniversary  of  the 
Landing  of  the  Pilgrims.  Until  his  election  as  Speaker 
he  continued  his  connection  with  the  militia,  successive- 
ly serving  on  the  stai^  of  Governors  Davis,  Armstrong, 
and  Everett,  the  duties  incident  to  which  position, 
necessitating  attendance  at  public  gatherings  in  all 
parts  of  the  State,  enabled  him  to  make  pleasant  ac- 
quaintances and  to  acquire  an  exceptional  knack  at 
impromptu  after-dinner  speaking.  His  diaries  during 
this  early  period  of  his  life  were  very  irregularly  kept, 
often  not  kept  at  all.  The  one  for  1836  is  fuller  than 
the  others,  and  in  it,  besides  chronicling  the  death  of 
President  Madison,  the  admission  of  Arkansas  and 
Michigan  to  the  Union,  some  noteworthy  remarks  of 
Mr.  Webster  on  the  subject  of  Agriculture,  and  the  re- 
markable fact  that  the  sun  was  not  visible  in  Boston 
from  the  21st  of  May  to  the  25th  of  June,  he  also 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  21 

describes  at  greater  or  less  length  Bunker  Hill  and 
Fourth  of  July  celebrations,  the  Two  Hundredth  anni- 
versaries of  Harvard  College  and  the  town  of  Dedham, 
and  great  reviews  of  troops  at  Greenfield  and  elsewhere. 
One  entry  I  copy  :  — 

July  28.  Dined  at  my  father's  in  company  with  J.  Q.  Adams, 
Chief  Justice  Shaw,  and  others.  President  Adams  did  all  the 
talking  and  was,  as  usual,  very  interesting.  He  said  that  he 
despaired  of  the  Union.  He  believed  that  the  population  of 
the  United  States  was  destined  soon  to  overrun  not  only 
Texas,  but  Mexico,  and  that  the  inevitable  result  would  be 
two  or  more  confederacies.  The  soil  of  Mexico  was  inviting, 
the  climate  alluring,  and  he  believed  the  country  would  fall 
an  easy  prey  to  our  hardy  adventurers.  He  prophesied  that 
a  century  hence  would  find  the  whole  North  American  con- 
tinent, from  Labrador  to  Panama,  and  from  the  Atlantic  to 
the  Pacific,  controlled  by  the  Anglo-Saxon  race,  which  would 
then  number  one  hundred  millions.  He  thought  the  Cana- 
dians were  rapidly  nearing  a  separation  from  British  rule, 
though  it  might  be  difficult  to  unite  them  with  us. 

In  those  days  Democrats  were  familiarly  styled  by 
their  opponents  "  Locofocos/'  —  a  long-extinct  epithet 
habitually  contracted  into  "Loco."  The  Loco  leader 
against  whom  Mr.  Winthrop  was  most  often  pitted  in 
debates  in  the  Legislature  was  Robert  Eantoul,  Jr.,  an 
able  man  who  eventually  succeeded  him  in  the  United 
States  Senate.  His  political  friends  in  Massachusetts 
were  then  so  numerous  that  I  name  only  those  of  whom 
he  saw  most,  two  of  them  much  older  than  himself,  and 
all  three  members  of  this  Society.  They  were  Leverett 
Saltonstall,  of  Salem,  who  afterward  served  with  him 
in  Congress;  the  great  orator,  Edward  Everett,  then 


22  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Governor,  of  whom  Mr.  Winthrop  was  long  the  confi- 
dential aide-de-camp;  and  John  H.  Clifford  of  New 
Bedford,  afterward  Governor  of  the  Commonwealth, 
with  whom  Mr.  Winthrop  maintained  a  familiar  corre- 
spondence for  forty  years.  His  tribute  to  Everett  and 
his  memoir  of  Clifford  are  to  be  found  both  in  our  own 
Proceedings  and  in  his  published  volumes.  Of  Salton- 
stall  he  wrote  in  a  commonplace  book,  after  the  latter' s 
death  in  1845  :  — 

He  had  as  large  a  heart  as  ever  beat  in  human  bosom,  an 
earnest  faith  in  things  higher  than  human.  His  ambition 
was  chastened  and  regulated.  He  would  have  followed  prin- 
ciples to  the  death,  but  not  men.  He  had  a  ready,  natural, 
charming  eloquence,  pouring  out  clear  and  wise  and  honest 
counsels  in  a  captivating  strain.  He  studied  enough  to 
know  what  he  was  talking  about,  and  was  a  well-read  lawyer 
and  scholar,  but  no  delver.  I  shall  always  honor  his  memory 
as  that  of  a  genial,  generous,  whole-souled  Christian  gentle- 
man, and  one  of  the  warmest  of  friends. 

Under  the  old  arrangement  of  electoral  districts  the 
county  of  Suffolk  returned  a  single  representative  to 
Congress,  known  as  the  "Member  for  Boston."  In 
1834  Abbott  Lawrence  was  appropriately  elected  to 
this  post,  but  the  cares  of  his  large  business  interests 
obliged  him  to  resign  in  1836,  when  some  admirers  of 
Mr.  Winthrop's  rhetoric  began  to  press  him  for  the 
succession,  though  he  withdrew  his  name  as  soon  as 
the  movement  came  to  his  knowledge,  considering  it 
ill-advised  and  premature.  Upon  the  resignation  of 
Richard  Fletcher  in  1839,  however,  the  same  movement 
became  much  more  general,  when  Mr.  Webster  sent  for 
Mr.  Winthrop  and  said  :  "  I  suppose  you  know  you  are 


ROBERT  C.    WINTHROP.  23 

again  talked  of  for  Congress,  and  this  time  I  have  no 
doubt  you  can  have  the  seat  if  you  really  wish  it.  But 
I  have  reason  to  think  our  friend  Lawrence  has  now 
more  leisure,  and  is  not  indisposed  for  another  term. 
His  good-will  is  important  to  the  party,  and  as  you  are 
so  young  a  man  and  certain  to  go  later,  perhaps  you 
will  not  mind  continuing  in  the  Legislature  for  the 
present."  Upon  Mr.  Winthrop's  expressing  his  assent 
to  this  arrangement,  Mr.  Webster  continued,  in  a  strain 
that  Mr.  Winthrop  long  afterward  regarded  as  pro- 
phetic :  "  I  have  had  less  hesitation  in  making  this 
suggestion  to  you  as  I  am  by  no  means  sure  you  will 
like  Washington  overmuch  when  you  get  there.  You 
have  gone  fast  in  Massachusetts  politics,  and  you  may 
go  far  in  National  ones.  You  are  thoroughly  equipped 
for  public  affairs.  You  have  in  addition  the  advantages 
of  not  having  to  work  for  your  living,  and  of  an 
acquired  readiness  in  debate,  which  is  a  precious  thing 
in  the  hour  of  need.  But,  with  all  this,  I  question 
whether  to  a  man  of  your  scholarly  instincts  and  fastidi- 
ous tastes,  the  atmosphere  of  self-seeking  and  misrep- 
resentation which  is  so  apt  to  surround  a  public  man 
of  the  first  rank  at  the  Capital,  will  not  prove  grievous 
and  disheartening,  —  whether  you  will  not  one  day 
weary  of  it  all,  and  wish  yourself  back  in  your  study 
at  home." 

Some  six  months  later,  in  the  spring  of  1840,  Mr. 
Webster  sent  for  him  to  confer  privately  with  regard 
to  the  approaching  Whig  nomination  for  the  Presidency. 
After  admitting  that  neither  Mr.  Clay  nor  himself  had 
any  chance  of  it,  he  deprecated  the  prevailing  move- 
ment in  favor  of  General  Harrison,  expressing  a  decided 


'24  A  MEMOIR  OF 

preference  for  General  Scott,  whom  lie  described  as  a 
Virginian  by  birth,  with  a  strong  following  in  the 
Middle  States,  a  military  career  sufficiently  adventurous 
to  tickle  the  masses,  a  good  fellow  in  every  way,  and 
a  man  not  merely  of  patriotic  instincts  but  of  robust 
frame,  whereas  Harrison  was  then  physically  some- 
what broken.  Mr.  Winthrop  expressed  entire  willing- 
ness to  join  in  trying  to  effect  Scott's  nomination,  but 
pointed  out  that  such  a  movement  would  be  much 
strengthened  if  it  were  understood  that  Mr.  Webster 
would  consent  to  waive  precedence  and  take  the  nomi- 
nation for  Vice-President.  Webster  did  not  altogether 
reject  this  idea,  and  efforts  were  made  in  various  quar- 
ters to  promote  a  "  Scott  and  Webster "  ticket ;  but 
popular  feeling  was  strongly  for  Harrison,  who  was 
nominated  and  elected  on  a  wave  of  enthusiasm  rarely, 
if  ever,  equalled  in  this  country.  Meantime  the  health 
of  Abbott  Lawrence  had  obliged  him  to  resign  his  seat, 
and  Mr.  Winthrop,  who  had  taken  an  active  part  in  the 
campaign,  was  returned  Member  for  Boston  at  the  same 
general  election, — -returned  not  merely  for  the  unex- 
pired term,  but  for  the  new  Congress  to  begin  in  March, 
and  by  a  larger  vote  than  that  accorded  to  any  of  his 
predecessors.  About  a  fortnight  before  the  polling  the 
following  letteijs  were  interchanged  by  him  and  a 
leading  Abolitionist  with  whom  he  was  not  personally 
acquainted. 

Boston,  Oct.  27,  1840. 
R.  C.  Winthrop,  Esq.  : 

Sir,  —  As  you  are  a  candidate  to  represent  this  district  in 
Congress,  permit  me  as  an  elector,  and  on  behalf  of  others  as 
well  as  myself,  to  know  your  sentiments  on  the  subject  of 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  25 

slavery,  so  far  as  they  may  relate  to  the  duties  of  a  member  of 
Congress.     For  that  purpose  I  would  respectfully  inquire, 

First,  whether  j^ou  concur  in  opinion  with  the  Resolves 
relating  to  slavery  and  the  slave-trade,  and  the  admission  of 
new  States  into  the  Union,  passed  at  the  last  session  of  the 
Legislature  of  this  Commonwealth  ? 

Secondly,  are  you  in  favor  of  abolishing  all  constitutional 
provisions  which  require  the  citizens  of  Free  States  to  aid  in 
supporting  and  perpetuating  slavery  ? 

I  wish  it  to  be  understood  that  these  inquiries  are  for  your 
present  views  and  opinions,  and  not  for  the  purpose  of  asking 
a  pledge  for  any  particular  course  of  action  in  relation  thereto 
as  a  member  of  Congress,  should  you  be  elected. 

Respectfully, 

Edmund  Jackson. 


Boston,  Nov.  2,  1840. 
Edmund  Jackson,  Esq.: 

SiE,  —  In  a  communication  received  by  me  a  few  days 
since  on  my  return  from  the  country,  you  call  on  me,  in 
behalf  of  others  as  well  as  yourself,  to  express  my  sentiments 
on  the  subject  of  slavery  so  far  as  they  relate  to  the  duties 
of  a  member  of  Congress,  and  to  that  end  you  propound  to 
me  two  inquiries. 

In  reply  to  the  first  of  those  inquiries,  I  beg  to  state  that 
while  I  believe  that  Congress  has  no  authority  to  interfere 
with  the  domestic  institutions  of  the  Southern  States,  yet  I 
have  never  seen  any  reason  to  doubt  that  it  possesses  all  the 
powers  contemplated  in  the  Resolutions  to  which  you  refer 
me.  I  have  no  hesitation  in  adding  that  my  vote  could  never 
be  withheld,  if  I  had  a  vote  to  give  in  Congress  or  elsewhere, 
whenever  I  should  see  a  just,  practicable,  and  Constitutional 
mode  of  diminishing  or  mitigating  so  great  an  evil  as  slavery. 
It  is  clear,  however,  that  were  I,  as  a  candidate  for  Congress, 
to  express  my  concurrence  in  the  Resolutions  in  question, 


26  A  MEMOIR  OF 

it  would  be  equivalent  to  a  pledge  that  I  would,  if  elected, 
exert  myself  individually  and  immediately  to  bring  about  the 
measures  which  they  propose.  Such  a  pledge  you  do  not 
seem  to  ask.  At  all  events,  it  is  one  which  I  should  be 
entirely  unwilling  to  give.  On  the  contrary,  I  might  lead 
you  into  error  were  I  not  explicitly  to  state  that,  should  I  be 
returned  to  Congress  at  the  approaching  election,  I  should 
not  conceive  it  as  among  the  special  duties  imposed  upon  me 
by  my  constituents  to  agitate  the  subject  of  slavery  in  any 
form. 

Your  second  inquiry  involves  considerations  which  have 
never  before  been  presented  to  my  mind.  After  such  brief 
reflection  as  I  have  been  able  to  bestow  upon  it,  I  feel  bound 
no  less  distinctly  to  declare  that  I  cannot  regard  it  as  desir- 
able or  expedient  to  attempt  any  alterations  of  the  Constitu- 
tion in  relation  to  slavery.  Certainly  the  best  hope  for  the 
Country  which  I  venture  to  entertain  at  present  is  that  the 
National  Compact  may  be  preserved  as  it  is,  and  may  be  once 
more  restored  to  its  true  interpretation  and  its  rightful  su- 
premacy. To  these  ends  any  humble  efforts  of  which  I  am 
capable  would  be  directed  should  the  electors  of  this  Congres- 
sional district  honor  me  with  a  majority  of  their  suffrages. 
I  am,  Sir,  very  respectfully. 

Your  ob*  servant, 

Robert  C.  Winthrop. 


n. 


The  winter  journey  of  a  New  England  Congressman 
to  Washington  in  those  days  often  involved  much 
fatigue  and  exposure.  Mr.  Winthrop  left  Boston  at  the 
beginning  of  December,  and  after  a  short  stay  in  New 
York,   reached    Philadelphia   without   hindrance.     His 


JET. 32. 


V  r^  "-.-i. 


K 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  27 

subsequent  adventures  are  best  described  in  his  own 
words :  — 

Left  Phil*  at  3,  on  Friday  aft.  with  Gov.  Levi  Lincoln 
for  companion.  Snow  was  then  falling,  and  before  dark  we 
were  involved  in  a  heavy  storm.  Between  9  and  10  p.  M. 
(near  Elkton)  the  engine-wheels  refused  to  revolve  any 
longer,  and  we  found  ourselves  several  miles  from  a  village, 
without  food  or  fuel,  the  fires  soon  going  out  in  the  stoves. 
There  was  no  chance  of  lying  down,  as  the  cars  were  crowded, 
so  there  Lincoln  and  I  sat  shoulder  to  shoulder  the  livelong 
night,  surrounded  by  a  lot  of  noisy  fellows,  who  made  our 
plight  additionally  hideous  by  their  profane  and  vulgar  mer- 
riment. The  next  morning  we  had  to  foot  it  in  the  snow 
more  than  two  miles  along  the  track  to  a  vile  tavern,  where 
we  got  a  miserable  breakfast.  Here  we  waited  five  hours  for 
the  track  to  be  cleared,  finally  reaching  Baltimore  at  9  on 
Saturday  evening,  half  starved  with  cold  and  hunger,  having 
had  no  meal  since  breakfast.  Sunday  the  storm  raged  even 
more  furiously,  and  I  was  not  indisposed  to  remain  quiet; 
but  about  10  A.  m.  Lincoln  came  to  me  and  said,  '  Colonel,  I 
don't  like  travelling  on  Sunday,  but  we  are  the  servants  of 
the  Government,  and  there  may  be  no  quorum  in  the  House 
to-morrow  unless  we  start  to-day.  There  is  no  religion  in 
spending  the  Sabbath  in  a  hotel  like  this,  and  the  porter  tells 
me  a  mail-train  leaves  in  half  an  hour,  with  a  good  chance  of 
reaching  Washington  before  dinner.'  We  left  accordingly, 
but  had  hardly  proceeded  five  miles  before  our  snow-plough 
broke  down,  and  could  not  be  moved,  thereby  obliging  us  to 
return  to  Baltimore,  and  try  the  Frederick  track  as  far  as 
Relay  House,  which  we  did  not  reach  till  7  P.  m.,  and  where 
we  got  the  first  mouthful  since  morning.  We  got  away  from 
Relay  soon  after  8,  but  found  the  snow-drifts  deeper  than 
ever.  We  were  continually  obliged  to  put  back  some  dis- 
tance to  gather  fresh  impetus,  and  it  was  not  till  nearly  day- 
break on  Monday  morning  that  I  caught  sight  of  the  columns 


28  A  MEMOIR  OF 

of  the  Capitol,  gilded  by  as  sweet  a  moonlight  as  ever  rested 
on  a  Roman  ruin.  Lincoln  and  I  trudged  on  foot  to  Gads- 
by's,  and,  after  a  bath  and  a  hearty  breakfast,  were  in  our 
seats  at  the  opening  of  the  House. 


Social  life  in  Washington  was  then  a  very  unpretend- 
ing affair.  It  was  a  rare  thing  for  a  member  of  either 
branch  of  Congress  to  own  or  rent  a  house.  The  pay 
was  only  eight  dollars  a  day  during  the  session,  with  an 
allowance  for  travelling  expenses,  and  a  few  insignificant 
perquisites,  such  as  newspapers,  letter-paper,  pens,  ink, 
sealing-wax,  blotting-books,  and  a  pen-knife.  Private 
rooms  in  the  Capitol,  private  secretaries  in  the  guise  of 
clerks  of  committees,  were  unknown;  while  even  a 
tithe  of  the  long  list  of  personal  expenses  and  luxuries 
now  charged  to  the  contingent  funds  would  have  ex- 
cited popular  indignation.  Members  lived  mostly  in 
large  private  boarding-houses,  the  occupants  of  which 
were  mutually  agreed  on  in  advance,  —  an  arrangement 
which  often  brought  into  close  association  men  from 
different  sections  of  the  Union,  besides  facilitating  the 
frequent  exercise  of  inexpensive  hospitality.  These 
boarding-houses  were  called  "  Messes,"  and  the  one  to 
which  Mr.  Winthrop  first  belonged  consisted,  in  addition 
to  his  wife  and  children  who  soon  joined  him,  of  his 
friend  Saltonstall  with  his  family,  of  Senator  Richard 
Bayard  of  Delaware  with  his  family,  and  of  Senator 
Henderson  of  Mississippi  with  his  family.  The  follow- 
ing winter  he  was  in  a  smaller  Mess,  consisting  of  his 
own  family  and  that  of  John  Pendleton  Kennedy,  then 
member  for  Baltimore,  afterward  Secretary  of  the  Navy 
and  President  of  the  Maryland  Historical  Society,  the 


ROBERT  C.    WINTHROP.  29 

most  genial  of  companions  and  most  entertaining  of 
correspondents,  perhaps  the  closest  of  all  Mr.  Win- 
throp's  friends,  and  to  whose  memory,  it  may  not  be  for- 
gotten, he  once  paid  a  warm  tribute  in  our  Proceedings. 
A  later  and  a  famous  Mess,  to  which  he  belonged  for 
years,  was  Mrs.  Whitwell's  on  Capitol  Hill,  where  his 
associates,  for  longer  or  shorter  periods,  were  his 
colleagues,  Joseph  Grinnell  and  George  Ashmun,  Sena- 
tors Bates  and  Davis  of  Massachusetts,  Senators  Dayton 
and  Miller  of  New  Jersey,  Senators  Berrien  of  Georgia 
and  Badger  of  North  Carolina,  with  George  Evans, 
successively  Kepresentative  and  Senator  from  Maine, 
one  of  the  most  eloquent  men  of  his  day,  now  almost 
forgotten.  Of  Mess  dinners  there  was  a  continual 
interchange.  Not  confined  to  one  particular  party, 
they  were  as  a  rule  very  informal,  though  now  and 
then  a  special  effort  was  made  in  honor  of  the  minister 
of  some  great  power,  some  distinguished  foreigner,  or 
some  pre-eminent  statesman  like  John  Quincy  Adams, 
Clay,  or  Webster.  Perhaps  the  most  notable  of  these 
dinners  at  which  Mr.  Winthrop  assisted  during  his  first 
session  was  a  friendly  contest  between  North  and  South 
as  to  which  could  place  on  table  the  best  old  wine. 
Samuel  L.  Southard,  Ogden  Hoffman,  and  Moses 
Grinnell  were  hosts  on  this  occasion,  while  the  cham- 
pion bottle-holder  of  the  South  was  Isaac  E.  Holmes 
of  Charleston.  Fourteen  famous  varieties  of  Madeira 
(seven  from  each  section)  were  produced  and  sampled, 
but  the  upshot  was  a  unanimous  and  discreet  decision 
to  have  another  trial.  Another  noteworthy  dinner  — 
though  in  the  ensuing  extra-session,  and  not  exactly  a 
Mess  dinner  —  was  at  Mr.  Webster's  at  the  time  when 


30  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Tyler's  tergiversation  had  so  disgusted  the  Whig  party, 
and  when  his  cabinet  had  all  resigned  except  Mr.  Web- 
ster, who  hesitated  to  relinquish  the  State  Department 
before  he  could  settle  the  Northeastern  boundary  ques- 
tion. The  dinner  was  at  what  would  now  be  consid- 
ered the  unearthly  hour  of  four  in  the  afternoon,  and 
on  his  way  to  the  dining-room  Mr.  Winthrop  observed 
a  one-horse  carryall  at  the  door,  from  which,  to  his 
great  astonishment,  emerged  alone  and  unattended  the 
small,  spare  form  of  President  Tyler,  who  ascended  the 
steps  with  an  air  of  mingled  perturbation  and  dejection. 
Upon  Mr.  Webster's  attention  being  called  to  this  cir- 
cumstance he  at  once  left  the  table,  and,  after  an 
absence  of  nearly  half  an  hour,  was  observed  to  conduct 
the  President  to  his  vehicle,  and  to  administer  to  him 
what  seemed  to  the  guests  at  the  window  to  be  a  con- 
soling pat  on  the  back.  Mr.  Winthrop  always  believed 
(though  he  did  not  know  the  fact)  that  Tyler  had  got 
wind  of  a  supposed  intention  to  resign  on  the  part  of 
the  Secretary  of  State,  that  he  had  come  on  the  spur  of 
the  moment  to  implore  him  to  stand  by  him,  and  had 
received  the  assurance  that  no  hostile  step  would  then 
be  taken.  It  need  hardly  be  said  that  Mr.  Webster's 
course  in  this  matter  excited  marked  differences  of 
opinion  among  the  Whigs.  Among  those  who  were 
represented  as  having  urged  him  to  resign  were  Mr. 
Winthrop  and  Mr.  Saltonstall.  This,  however,  was  not 
the  case.  Their  advice  to  him  was  to  do  whatever,  in 
his  judgment,  would  be  for  the  best  interests  of  the 
country;  but  they  deprecated  any  reflection  on  his 
colleagues. 

Mr.  Winthrop  made   no  formal  speech  in  Congress 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  31 

during  his  first  winter,  preferring  not  to  seem  to  push 
himself  forward.  Moreover,  though  he  enjoyed  Wash- 
ington society,  he  found  that  the  cHmate  disagreed  with 
him  and  was  ill  for  several  weeks  with  a  sort  of  accli- 
mating fever.  A  little  later  he  was  called  home  by  the 
sudden  death  of  his  aged  father,  whose  last  message  of 
love  to  his  absent  son  was  the  assurance  that  he  had 
never  once  given  him  a  moment's  uneasiness.  His  first 
effort  was  made  in  the  ensuing  extra  session,  July  2, 
1841,  in  the  debate  on  the  Distribution  of  the  Public 
Lands,  —  followed,  on  the  28th  of  the  same  month,  by 
a  speech  on  the  National  Revenue,  which  is  alluded  to 
in  the  published  diary  of  John  Quincy  Adams  as  "a 
very  able  argument."  In  the  autumn  he  was  active,  as 
usual,  in  the  State  canvass.  Even  in  Massachusetts 
Tyler's  defection  had  greatly  damaged  the  Whig  party, 
concerning  which,  in  his  diary  for  November  5,  Mr. 
Adams  wrote :  "  It  is  splitting  into  a  thousand  frag- 
ments. Abbott  Lawrence  is  struggling  to  sustain  it, 
and  Rufus  Choate  and  Robert  C.  Winthrop  and  Leve- 
rett  Saltonstall  are  haranguing  Whig  caucus  meetings 
throughout  the  State,  in  vain,  to  support  it.  The  gen- 
eral expectation  is  that  Democracy  will  ride  rough-shod 
over  the  whole  country.  The  ambitious  politicians  are 
trimming  their  sails  to  the  breeze.  .  .  .  Caleb  Gushing 
has  taken  a  lover's  leap  over  to  the  Tyler  territory  and 
makes  his  court  to  the  Lady  Elizabeth."  Not  long  after 
the  re-assembling  of  Congress  Mr.  Winthrop  delivered 
(Dec.  30,  1841)  an  elaborate  speech  on  the  Policy  of 
Discriminating  Duties,  in  allusion  to  which  Mr.  Adams 
wrote,  "Mr.  Winthrop's  promise  as  an  orator  and  de- 
bater in  the  House  is  of  the  highest  order." 


32  A  MEMOIR  OF 

The  next  few  months  slowly  developed  a  dark  cloud 
on  his  domestic  horizon.  Mrs.  Winthrop,  who  had  been 
in  excellent  health  during  the  first  nine  years  of  her 
married  life,  had  latterly  exhibited  a  delicacy  of  the 
lungs  which  created  no  alarm  at  the  time,  but  which 
in  the  course  of  the  winter  enfeebled  her  to  such  an  ex- 
tent that  she  was  removed  in  the  spring  from  Washing- 
ton to  Boston,  where  she  died,  at  the  age  of  thirty-three, 
June  14,  1842,  to  the  grief  of  all  who  knew  her.  In 
order  to  enable  her  husband  to  be  with  her  in  her  last 
illness  and  at  the  same  time  not  to  lose  a  Whig  vote  in 
the  House  upon  the  important  questions  then  pending, 
an  arrangement  was  made  by  which  Mr.  Winthrop 
resigned  his  seat,  which  was  filled  by  his  friend  Nathan 
Appleton,  one  of  its  former  occupants,  who  retired  in 
the  following  autumn,  when  Mr.  Winthrop  was  again 
returned. 

On  the  20th  of  January,  1843,  he  read  to  the  House 
an  exhaustive  Report  —  the  most  important  ever  made 
on  that  subject  —  on  the  Imprisonment  of  Free  Colored 
Seamen  in  Southern  ports,  and  five  days  later  he  made 
a  speech  on  the  Safe-keeping  of  the  Public  Moneys, 
contending  that  the  Exchequer  Bill  then  before  the 
House  ought  not  to  be  adopted,  and  taking  occasion  to 
reply  to  some  recent  attacks  upon  Mr.  Webster,  though 
he  frankly  confessed  that  he  was  not  in  accord  with 
much  that  had  fallen  from  the  latter  in  his  well-known 
speech  at  Faneuil  Hall  some  months  before.^    In  chroni- 

^  A  speech  described  by  J.  Q.  Adams,  always  severe  upon  Webster, 
as  "  bitter  as  wormwood  to  nearly  the  whole  of  the  Whig  party  and 
sweeter  than  honey  to  the  radical  Democracy ;  boastful,  cunning,  Jesuiti- 
cal, fawning,  and  insolent ;  ambiguous  in  its  givings  out,  avowing  his 
determination  not  to  let  them  know  whether  he  intends  to  resign  his 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROR  83 

cling  this  Exchequer  debate  Mr.  Adams  says,  "Three 
one-hour  speeches  were  successively  delivered  by  D.  D. 
Barnard,  R.  C.  Winthrop,  and  T.  F.  Marshall,  all  of  the 
highest  order  of  eloquence,  though  with  irreconcilable 
dissent  of  opinions."  This  was  a  great  compliment  to 
the  two  first-named  gentlemen,  as  Tom  Marshall  of 
Kentucky  (as  he  was  generally  styled)  had  a  great  repu- 
tation for  oratory.  On  the  12th  of  the  following  Octo- 
ber, Mr.  Winthrop  made  an  elaborate  speech  in  Faneuil 
Hall,  which  he  entitled  The  Credit  of  Massachusetts 
Vindicated,  and  soon  after  the  reassembling  of  Congress 
he  had,  on  the  19th  of  December,  a  passage  of  arms 
with  Henry  A.  Wise  of  Virginia  on  the  subject  of  the 
President's  Message. 

In  January,  1844,  he  addressed  the  House  at  length 
on  the  Right  of  Petition.  His  speech  on  this  occasion 
has  been  often  characterized  as  the  leading  authority 
on  the  parliamentary  law  of  the  question,  and  it  was 
described  by  Mr.  Adams  on  the  day  of  its  delivery 
as  "an  excellent  one,  but  repeatedly  interrupted  by  the 

addle-headed  blunders  of about  a  precedent  from 

Hatsell  in  1665."     His  peroration  was  as  follows :  — 

Mr,  Speaker,  we  ask  for  these  petitions  only  that  you 
will  treat  them  as  you  treat  other  petitions.  We  set  up 
for  them  no  absurd  or  extravagant  pretensions.  We  claim 
for  them  no  exclusive  or  engrossing  attention.  We  desire 
only  that  you  will  adopt  no  prescriptive  and  passionate  course 
with  regard  to  them.  We  demand  only  that  you  will  allow 
them  to  go  through  the  same  orderly  round  of  reception, 

office  or  not,  arguing  all  sorts  of  reasons  for  his  retaining  it,  but  intimat- 
ing that  he  may  perhaps  release  his  grasp  upon  it ;  dealing  open  blows 
at  the  late  Whig  Convention  for  their  resolution  of  total  severance  from 
John  Tyler,  and  sly  stabs  at  Clay  and  me,  without  naming  either  of  us." 

3 


34  A  MEMOIR   OF 

reference,  and  report,  with  all  other  petitions.  When  they 
have  gone  through  that  round,  they  will  be  just  as  much 
under  your  own  control  as  they  were  before  they  entered  on 
it.  I  heartily  hope,  sir,  that  this  course  is  now  about  to  be 
adopted.  I  hope  it  as  an  advocate  of  the  right  of  petition. 
I  hope  it  is  as  a  Northern  man  with  Northern  principles,  if 
you  please  to  term  me  so.  But  I  hope  it  not  less  as  an 
American  citizen  with  American  principles ;  as  a  friend  to 
the  Constitution  and  the  Union ;  as  one  who  is  as  little  dis- 
posed to  interfere  with  any  rights  of  other  States  as  to  sur- 
render any  rights  of  his  own  State ;  as  one  who,  though  he 
may  see  provisions  of  the  Constitution  which  are  odious  in 
principle  and  unjust  in  practice,  — provisions  which  he  would 
gladly  have  had  omitted  at  the  outset,  and  gladly  see  altered 
now  if  such  an  alteration  were  practicable,  —  is  yet  willing  to 
stand  by  our  Constitution  as  it  is,  our  Union  as  it  is,  our  Ter- 
ritory as  it  is  !  I  honestly  believe  that  the  course  of  this 
House  in  relation  to  these  petitions  has  done  more  than  all 
other  causes  combined  to  bring  the  Constitution  into  disre- 
gard and  the  Union  into  danger.  Other  causes  have  indeed 
co-operated  with  this  cause.  Your  arbitrary  and  oppressive 
State  laws  for  imprisoning  our  free  colored  seamen;  your 
abhorrent  proposal  to  annex  Texas  to  the  Union,  in  violation 
of  the  compromises  of  the  Constitution,  —  yes,  sir,  of  those 
very  compromises  on  which  Adams  and  Hancock  met  Jef- 
ferson and  Madison  (to  use  language  recently  employed  on 
this  floor) ;  these  laws  and  these  proposals  have  unquestion- 
ably co-operated  of  late  with  the  denial  of  the  right  of  peti- 
tion, in  exciting  in  some  quarters  a  spirit  of  discontent  with 
our  existing  system.  But  this  rule  of  the  House  has  been 
the  original  spring  of  the  whole  feeling.  And  to  what  ad- 
vantage on  the  part  of  those  by  whom  it  was  devised  ?  Have 
Southern  institutions  been  any  safer  since  its  establishment  ? 
Have  the  enemies  to  those  institutions  been  rendered  any  less 
ardent  or  less  active  by  it?  Has  agitation  on  the  subject  of 
slave  :y  in  this  Hall  been  repressed  or  allayed  by  it  ?    Have 


EGBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  35 

these  petitions  and  resolutions  been  diminislied  in  number 
under  its  operation  and  influence  ?  No,  sir,  the  very  reverse, 
the  precise  opposite  of  all  this,  has  been  the  result.  The  at- 
tempt of  this  House  to  suppress  and  silence  all  utterance  on 
the  subject  of  slavery  has  terminated  as  did  the  attempt  of 
one  of  the  kings  of  ancient  Judah  to  suppress  the  warnings 
of  the  prophet  of  God.  The  prophet,  we  are  told,  took  an- 
other roll  and  wrote  on  it  all  the  words  which  the  king  had 
burned  in  the  fire,  and  '  there  were  added  besides  unto  them 
many  like  words !  *  And  this  always  has  been,  and  always 
will  be,  the  brief  history  of  every  effort  to  silence  free  in- 
quiry and  stifle  free  discussion.  I  thank  Heaven  that  it  is 
so.  It  is  this  inherent  and  inextinguishable  elasticity  of 
opinion,  of  conscience,  of  inquiry,  which,  like  the  great  agent 
of  modern  art,  gains  only  new  force,  fresh  vigor,  redoubled 
powers  of  progress  and  propulsion,  by  every  degree  of  com- 
pression and  restraint ;  it  is  this  to  which  the  world  owes  all 
the  liberty  it  has  yet  acquired  and  to  which  it  will  owe  all 
that  is  yet  in  store  for  it.  Well  did  John  Milton  exclaim,  in 
his  noble  defence  of  unlicensed  printing,  '  Give  me  the  lib- 
erty to  know,  to  utter,  and  to  argue  freely,  above  all  liberties,' 
—  for  in  securing  that,  we  secure  the  all-sufficient  instrument 
for  achieving  all  other  liberties. 

Having  been  privately  v^arned  by  Mr.  Webster  that 
Tyler  was  bent  on  signalizing  the  close  of  his  adminis- 
tration by  an  attempt  to  compass  the  annexation  of 
Texas,  Mr.  Winthrop  offered  in  the  House  (March  15, 
1844)  the  following  Resolution :  — 

Resolved^  That  no  proposition  for  the  annexation  of  Texas 
to  the  United  States  ought  to  be  made  or  assented  to  by  this 
Government. 

Jacob  Thompson  of  Mississippi  objected  to  its  re- 
ception, when   Mr.  Winthrop   moved   to   suspend   the 


36  A   MEMOIR   OF 

rules,  but  was  defeated  by  a  vote  of  122  to  40.  Three 
days  later  he  made  what  might  be  termed  a  rattling 
speech  on  the  Oregon  Bill,  charging  the  Democratic 
party  with  being  always  ready  to  stir  up  prejudice 
against  England  for  political  purposes  —  with  a  habit 
of  accusing  every  one  who  did  not  fall  in  with  their 
policy  of  being  under  some  sort  of  British  influence  — 
and  with  a  disposition  to  make  hatred  of  England  a  sort 
of  standard  of  American  patriotism.  From  this  indict- 
ment, however,  he  excepted  Mr.  Calhoun,  who  had  de- 
clared that  the  "  crowning  glory  "  of  the  recent  Treaty 
of  Washington  was  its  establishing  "  permanent  amity 
and  peace  "  between  the  two  nations.^ 

On  the  16th  of  May  he  made  a  Report  from  the  Com- 
mittee on  Commerce  on  the  subject  of  American  Sea- 
men in  Foreign  Ports,  and  after  the  adjournment  of 
Congress  he  was  a  frequent  speaker  in  that  disastrous 
Presidential  campaign  which  ended  in  the  defeat  of  the 
Whig  candidate,  to  the  consternation  of  his  followers. 
"  The  stars  in  their  courses,''  wrote  Mr.  Winthrop, 
"  seem  to  be  warring  against  us.  First,  Harrison's 
death,  then  Tyler's  treachery,  now  Clay's  defeat.  Al- 
though my  admiration  for  the  latter  had  grown  less 
ardent  than  of  old,  I  still  considered  him  the  one  man 
in  the  country  who,  all  things  considered,  best  de- 
served the  Presidency.  And  now  to  have  him  beaten 
by  a  Polk !  I  dread  in  the  near  future  foreign  wars, 
with  a  marked  increase  of  sectional  irritation."  Writ- 
ing on  the  same  subject  thirty-six  years  afterward,  he 
said :  "  The  result  of  the  election  afforded  the  first  ex- 

1  J.  Q.  Adams  says  this  speech  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  was  "  off-hand," 
and  that  it  made  C.  J.  Ingersoll  "eat  his  words." 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  37 

ample,  so  often  reproduced  in  later  years,  of  the  advan- 
tage enjoyed  by  a  candidate  who  had  said  little,  done 
little,  and  made  few  enemies,  over  one  who  has  been 
constantly  in  the  public  eye,  never  shrinking  from  re- 
sponsibility, and  never  failing  to  take  a  decided  part  in 
every  controversy.  No  more  serious  discouragement  to 
great  abilities  and  great  services  as  qualifications  and 
recommendations  for  high  office  was  ever  experienced 
than  in  the  preference  given  to  Polk  over  Clay  in 
1844."  He  realized,  however,  that  the  immediate  cause 
of  Clay's  defeat,  the  loss  of  the  State  of  New  York, 
was  chiefly  due  to  the  exertions  of  the  so-called  Liberty 
party,  who  thus  became,  in  his  judgment,  the  indirect 
movers  of  the  annexation  of  Texas  and  the  Mexican 
War/ 

In  November,  1844,  Mr.  Adams  records  a  long  con- 
versation with  Mr.  Winthrop  concerning  the  latter's 
kinsman,  George  William  Erving  (between  whom  and 
himself  had  long  existed  a  bitter  feud  which  Mr.  Win- 
throp was  endeavoring  to  heal),  adding,  "  I  assured  Mr. 
Winthrop,  also,  that  my  son  would  countenance  no  de- 
sign or  attempt  to  place  him  in  competition  with  him, 
and  that  he  would  have  my  best  wishes  for  his  continu- 
ance in  his  present  station  as  long  a*s  it  would  be  agree- 
able to  him  and  for  his  promotion  to  any  other  office 
of  higher  dignity  and  importance.  He  expressed  much 
gratification  at  these  assurances,  but  said  he  had  de- 
termined not  to  serve  in  Congress  after  this  next  elec- 
tion."    This  last  sentence  requires  explanation,  as  it  is 

^  It  may  be  remembered  that  J.  Q.  Adams  said  in  his  diary,  "  The 
electioneering  of  the  Liberty  party,  from  Birney,  their  head,  down,  is 
more  knavish  than  that  of  either  of  the  others." 


38  A  MEMOIR  OF 

so  worded  that  a  reader  might  suppose  that  Mr.  Win- 
throp  had  intended  to  retire  from  Congress  at  the  close 
of  1844,  whereas  the  intention  he  expressed  was  not 
again  to  become  a  candidate  after  the  election  then  in  pro- 
gress,  which  was  for  a  term  ending  March  4, 1847.  His 
reason  for  this  decision  (to  which,  as  will  be  seen,  he 
did  not  adhere)  was  that  he  had  grown  tired  of  Wash- 
ington. In  spite  of  its  social  attractions  and  in  spite  of 
his  oratorical  successes,  he  had  felt  lonely  there  since 
his  wife's  death,  and  the  climate  grew  more  and  more 
distasteful  to  him,  having  a  tendency  to  make  him 
feverish.  On  the  6th  of  January,  1845,  he  made  an 
hour's  speech  against  the  annexation  of  Texas,  ending 
with  the  following  paragraph  :  — 

I  am  against  annexation  now  and  always,  —  because  I  be- 
lieve it  to  be  clearly  unconstitutional  in  substance ;  because  I 
believe  it  will  break  up  the  balance  of  our  system,  violate  the 
Compromises  of  the  Constitution,  and  endanger  the  perma- 
nence of  our  Union ;  and,  above  all,  because  I  am  uncom- 
promisingly opposed  to  the  extension  of  domestic  slavery,  or 
to  the  addition  of  another  inch  of  slaveholding  territory  to 
this  nation. 

On  the  2d  of  February,  1845,  he  made  a  second 
speech  on  the  Oregon  Bill,  which  contained  the  follow- 
ing passages :  ^  — 

No  more  negotiations  !  Why,  Mr.  Chairman,  where  is 
such  a  doctrine  as  this  to  lead  us ?  Inevitably  to  war.  To 
war  with  England  now,  to  war  with  all  the  world  hereafter, 

^  J.  Q.  Adams  calls  it  "  an  excellent  speech,"  and  says  it  was  "  an- 
swered with  brutality  by  Shepard  Gary  of  Maine,  and  Andrew  Kennedy 
of  Indiana." 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  39 

or  certainly  with  all  parts  of  the  world  with  which  we  may 
have  controversies  of  any  sort,  and  even  war  can  never  put 
an  end  to  the  necessity  of  negotiation.  Unless  war  is  to  be 
perpetual,  you  must  come  back  to  negotiation  in  the  end. 
The  only  question  in  the  case  before  us  —  the  only  question 
in  the  case  of  disputed  international  rights  —  is  not  whether 
you  will  negotiate  or  fight,  but  whether  you  will  negotiate 
only,  or  negotiate  and  fight  both.  Battles  will  never  settle 
boundaries  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States,  in 
Oregon  or  elsewhere.  The  capture  of  ships,  the  destruction 
of  commerce,  the  burning  and  plundering  of  cities,  will  leave 
us  just  where  we  began.  First  or  last,  negotiation  alone  can 
settle  this  question.  For  one,  then,  I  am  for  negotiation  first, 
before  war  and  without  war.  I  believe  that  we  shall  get 
quite  as  much  of  Oregon  in  this  way ;  and  I  know  that  we 
shall  get  it  at  less  expense,  not  merely  of  money,  but  of  all 
that  makes  up  the  true  honor  and  welfare  of  our  country. 
Sir,  the  reckless  flippancy  with  which  war  is  spoken  of  in  this 
House  as  a  thing  to  be  '  let  come,'  rather  than  wait  for  the 
issue  of  negotiations,  is  deserving,  in  my  judgment,  of  the 
severest  rebuke  and  reprobation  from  any  Christian  patriot 
and  statesman.  I  say  let  it  not  come,  let  it  never  come,  if  any 
degree  of  honorable  patience  and  forbearance  will  avert  it.  I 
protest  against  any  course  of  proceeding  which  shall  invite  or 
facilitate  its  approach.  I  protest  against  it  in  behalf  of  the 
Commerce  of  the  nation,  so  considerable  a  part  of  which  I 
have  the  honor  to  represent.  I  protest  against  it  in  the  name 
of  Morality  and  Religion,  which  ought  to  be  represented  by 
every  member  on  this  floor.  .  .  . 

I  intend  no  disrespect  to  any  gentleman  who  hears  me; 
but  as  I  have  listened  to  the  heroic  strains  which  have  re- 
sounded through  this  hall  for  some  days  past,  in  reference  to 
the  facility  with  which  we  could  muster  our  fleets  in  the 
Pacific,  and  march  our  armies  over  the  Rocky  Mountains, 
and  whip  Great  Britain  into  a  willingness  to  abandon  her  pre- 
tensions,  I   have  wished   that  some    Philip    Faulconbridge 


40  A  MEMOIR  OF 

were  here  to  reply,  as  he  does  in  Shakespeare's  "  King  John," 
to  some  swaggering  citizen  of  Angiers  — 

Here  's  a  large  mouth  indeed, 

That  spits  forth  death  and  mountains,  rocks  and  seas ; 

Talks  as  familiarly  of  roaring  lions, 

As  maids  of  thirteen  do  of  puppy-dogs. 

He  speaks  plain  cannon,  fire,  and  smoke,  and  bounce  ! 

And  against  whom  are  all  these  gasconading  bravadoes 
indulged  ?  What  nation  has  been  thus  bethumpt  and  basti- 
nadoed with  brave  words  ?  I  have  no  compliments  to  bestow 
on  Great  Britain,  and  am  not  here  as  her  apologist  or  defen- 
der. But  this,  at  least,  I  can  say  without  fear  of  imputation 
or  impugnment,  that  of  all  the  nations  in  the  world  she  is 
that  nation  which  is  able  to  do  us  the  most  good  in  peace  and 
the  most  harm  in  war.  She  is  that  nation  with  whom  the 
best  interests  of  our  country  imperatively  demand  of  us  to 
go  along  harmoniously  so  long  as  we  can  do  so  with  unques- 
tioned right  and  honor.  She  is  that  nation  a  belligerent  con- 
flict with  whom  would  put  back  the  cause  of  human  civiliza- 
tion and  improvement  more  than  it  has  advanced  in  a  half- 
century  past,  or  would  recover  in  a  half-century  to  come. 
Peace  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  is  not  a 
mere  interest  of  the  two  countries.  It  is  an  interest  of  the 
world,  of  civilization,  of  humanity:  and  a  fearful  reckoning 
will  be  theirs  who  shall  wantonly  disturb  it.  .  .  . 

But  then.  Great  Britain  is  so  insolent  and  so  aggressive 
that  we  can't  help  hating  her.  She  is  hemming  us  round  on 
every  side,  the  honorable  member  from  Illinois  ^  tells  us,  and 
we  must  make  a  stand  against  her  soon,  or  we  shall  be  abso- 
lutely overrun!  How  far,  sir,  will  such 'a  declaration  bear 
the  light  of  historical  truth  ?  It  would  seem  to  imply  that 
the  United  States  of  America  was  the  original  civilized  nation 
established  on  this  continent ;  that  Great  Britain  had  subse- 
quently made  settlements  in  our  neighborhood ;  and  that  she 

*  Stephen  A.  Douglas. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  41 

had  systematically  proceeded  to  environ  us  on  all  sides  with 
her  colonial  possessions  and  military  posts.  This  is  certainly 
a  new  reading  of  American  history.  I  have  somehow  or  other 
obtained  an  impression  from  the  schools  that  Great  Britain 
once  possessed  almost  the  whole  of  this  continent,  or,  at  any 
rate,  a  very  much  larger  part  than  she  now  enjoys.  I  have  an 
indistinct  idea  that  there  was  a  day  when  she  held  dominion 
over  almost  all  the  territories  in  which  we  now  rejoice.  I 
have  some  dreamy  recollection  of  having  read  or  heard  about 
stamp  acts,  and  tea  taxes,  and  Boston  port  bills ;  about  Bun- 
ker hills,  and  Saratogas,  and  Yorktowns  -,  about  revolutions 
and  declarations  and  treaties  of  Independence.  And  it  is  still 
my  belief,  Mr.  Chairman,  which  fire  will  not  burn  out  of  me, 
that  Great  Britain  has  been  deprived,  within  the  last  seventy 
years,  of  her  most  valuable  possessions  on  this  continent,  and 
that  instead  of  her  hemming  us  in,  we  have  thrust  her  out, 
and  left  her,  comparatively  speaking,  a  second-rate  power  in 
this  Western  hemisphere.  She  has  not  acquired  one  foot  of 
soil  upon  this  continent  except  in  the  way  of  honorable  treaty 
with  our  own  government  since  the  day  on  which  we  finally 
ousted  her  from  the  limits  of  our  Republican  Union.  Every- 
body knows  that  she  acquired  Canada  by  the  treaty  of  1763. 
We  ourselves  helped  her  to  that  acquisition.  Not  a  few  of 
the  forces  —  not  a  few  of  the  leaders  —  by  which  our  own 
independence  was  achieved  were  trained  up,  as  by  a  Provi- 
dential preparation,  for  the  noble  duty  which  awaited  them, 
in  the  war  which  resulted  in  the  cession  of  Canada  to  Great 
Britain.  Certainly  we  have  no  cause  of  quarrel  with  Great 
Britain  that  Canada  is  hers.  But  then,  she  has  dared  to  think 
about  Texas,  she  has  cast  some  very  suspicious  glances  at  Cuba, 
and  there  is  great  reason  to  apprehend  that  her  heart  is  at  this 
moment  upon  California !  True,  she  has  formally  denied  to 
our  own  Government  that  she  has  any  desire  to  see  Texas 
other  than  an  independent  nation.  True,  she  once  conquered 
Cuba  and  gave  it  back  to  Spain  by  the  treaty  of  1763.  True, 
she  has  given  no  outward  and  visible  sign  of  any  passionate 


42  A  MEMOIR  OF 

yearning  for  the  further  dismemberment  of  Mexico.  But  who 
trusts  to  diplomatic  assurances  ?  Who  confides  in  innocent 
appearances  ?  Has  not  the  Chairman  of  our  own  Committee 
of  Foreign  Affairs  ^  warned  us  that  diplomatic  assurances, 
like  the  oaths  which  formerly  accompanied  treaties,  are  the 
cheap  contrivances  of  premeditated  hostile  action,  and  that 
the  assurance  of  Great  Britain  with  regard  to  Texas  is  but 
'  the  ordinary  harbinger  of  whatever  it  most  solemnly  denies '  ? 
Such  a  course  of  argument  as  this,  Mr.  Chairman,  is  certainly 
in  one  respect  conclusive.  There  is  obviously  no  mode  of 
replying  to  it.  Once  assume  the  position  that  neither  the 
words  nor  the  deeds  of  Great  Britain  are  to  be  taken  in  evi- 
dence of  her  designs,  but  that  her  assurances  are  all  hollow 
and  her  acts  all  hypocritical,  and  there  is  no  measure  of 
aggression  and  outrage  which  you  may  not  justly  apprehend 
from  her.  But,  sir,  I  boldly  put  the  question  to  the  con- 
sciences of  all  who  hear  me,  —  Of  which  of  the  two  countries. 
Great  Britain  or  the  United  States,  will  impartial  history  re- 
cord that  it  manifested  a  spirit  of  impatient  and  insatiate  self- 
aggrandizement  on  this  North  American  continent?  How 
does  the  record  stand  as  already  made  up  ?  If  Great  Britain 
has  been  thinking  of  Texas,  we  have  acquired  Louisiana  ;  if 
Great  Britain  has  been  looking  after  Cuba,  we  have  estab- 
lished ourselves  in  Florida ;  if  Great  Britain  has  set  her  heart 
on  California,  we  have  put  our  hand  on  Texas.  Reproach 
Great  Britain,  if  you  please,  with  the  policy  she  has  pursued 
in  extending  her  dominions  elsewhere.  Reprobate,  if  you 
please,  her  course  of  aggression  upon  the  East  Indian  tribes, 
and  do  not  forget  to  include  your  own  Indian  policy  in  the 
same  commination.  But  let  us  hear  no  more  of  her  encroach- 
ing spirit  in  this  quarter.  It  is  upon  ourselves  and  not  upon 
her  that  such  a  spirit  may  be  more  fairly  charged.  I  say  to  the 
gentleman  from  Illinois,  the  peculiar  champion  of  annexing 
Texas  and  occupying  the  whole  of  Oregon,  mutato  nomine^  de 
te  fabula  narratur. 

1  Charles  J.  Ingersoll  of  Philadelphia. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  43 

Finding  that  Indian  slavery  then  existed  in  Oregon, 
as  shown  by  public  documents,  and  that  there  was 
nothing  in  the  Bill  to  prevent  the  legalization  of  domes- 
tic slavery  there,  Mr.  Winthrop  then  moved  that  "  there 
shall  be  neither  slavery  nor  involuntary  servitude  in 
this  Territory  except  for  crime,  whereof  the  party  shall 
have  been  duly  convicted."  This  amendment  was 
carried  by  a  vote  of  131  to  69,  and  differs  only  from 
the  famous  proviso  subsequently  brought  forward  by 
David  Wilmot  in  that  it  applied  to  territory  already 
belonging  to  the  United  States,  and  not  to  any  which 
might  thereafter  be  acquired. 

The  following  extract  from  Sketches  of  the  Twenty- 
eighth  Congress,  printed  at  this  time  in  a  Pennsylvania 
newspaper,  gives  some  idea  of  the  reputation  he  had 
now  gained  away  from  home  :  — 

"  Robert  C.  Winthrop  is,  by  common  consent,  one  of  the 
ablest  men  in  the  House,  and  in  a  Whig  Congress  would  not 
improbably  be  Speaker.  Candid,  honorable,  and  high-minded, 
he  is  above  the  tricks  of  intrigue,  and  every  progressive  step 
of  his  public  life  has  been  marked  by  increased  evidences  of 
intellectual  power.  As  a  speaker,  he  is  clear,  concise,  and 
occasionally  very  eloquent.  He  speaks  but  rarely,  but  is 
always  listened  to  with  attention.  He  has  an  exceptionally 
fine  voice,  an  impassioned  manner,  and  a  warm  and  brilliant 
imagination,  which  frequently  lights  up  his  speeches  with 
gleams  of  bold  and  brilliant  fancy.  He  is  tall  in  stature, 
with  the  face  of  a  scholar  and  serious  thinker.  With  those 
who  know  him  well,  on  both  sides  of  the  House,  he  is  a  great 
favorite,  but  the  criticism  has  been  made  that  he  is  a  little 
too  refined  and  dignified  for  some  of  his  surroundings.  A 
man  of  rougher  temperament,  even  if  less  intellectual,  is 
often  better  suited  for  a  party  captain." 


44  A  MEMOIR  OF 


m. 

The  manifest  purpose  of  Tyler  and  Calhoun  to  pro- 
cure the  annexation  of  Texas  had  long  excited  great 
indignation  in  New  England.  On  the  29th  of  January, 
1845,  a  Convention  of  the  People  of  Massachusetts 
opposed  to  such  annexation  had  been  held  in  Faneuil 
Hall,  at  which  a  Committee  of  Correspondence  was 
appointed  to  confer  in  any  emergency  with  persons  in 
this  or  other  States.  This  Committee,  composed  of 
three  prominent  Massachusetts  Whigs,  —  Stephen  C. 
Phillips,  Charles  Allen,  and  Charles  Francis  Adams,  — 
issued  on  the  25th  of  June  a  circular  letter  containing 
the  following  passage :  — 

"  If  the  annexation  of  Texas  were  already  consummated ;  if 
it  did  not  necessarily  await  the  further  action  of  Congress ; 
if  the  voice  of  the  People  might  not  yet  be  heard  in  remon- 
strance against  it, — we  should  feel  that  we  could  only  consider 
and  ask  you  to  consider  the  last  alternative  of  submission  to 
a  violated  Constitution  and  the  will  of  its  violators,  or  an 
effort  to  obtain,  at  whatever  hazard,  that  Constitutional  guar- 
anty of  Liberty  unalloyed  with  Slavery  which  alone  can 
secure  to  the  country  of  our  Fathers  the  spirit  and  substance, 
and  not  merely  the  form,  of  a  Republican  Government." 

With  many  expressions  of  opinion  in  this  circular  Mr. 
Winthrop  cordially  agreed,  but  the  only  interpretation 
he  was  able  to  place  upon  the  words  1  have  italicised 
in  the  above  passage,  and  upon  very  similar  expressions 
previously  used  in  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  and 
elsewhere,  was  that  they  amounted  to  a  covert  sugges- 
tion that  under  certain  circumstances  it  might  be  well 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  45 

for  New  England  to  secede  from  the  Union  because  she 
could  not  have  her  own  way,  —  a  course  to  which  Mr. 
Winthrop  was  unalterably  opposed.  From  his  point  of 
view,  the  resistance  of  the  North  to  any  extension  of 
the  area  of  slavery  should  be  a  resistance  within  consti- 
tutional limits  and  upon  the  floor  of  Congress ;  and  if 
the  Democratic  party  should  succeed  in  compassing  the 
annexation  of  Texas,  it  would,  in  his  judgment,  be 
better  to  submit  to  it  than  to  try  to  break  the  Union 
into  fragments.  As  his  father  had  left  the  Federalist 
party  because  he  could  not  reconcile  with  loyalty  to  the 
Union  the  course  of  certain  Federalist  leaders  at  the 
breaking  out  of  the  War  of  1812,  so  he,  in  turn,  depre- 
cated the  possibility  that  a  suspicion  of  disloyalty 
should  now  attach  to  Massachusetts  Whigs.  Having 
been  called  upon  for  remarks  at  the  ensuing  Fourth 
of  July  dinner  in  Faneuil  Hall,  he  offered  on  that 
occasion  the  following  toast :  — 

Oun  Country,  —  Whether  bounded  by  the  St.  John's  and 
the  Sabine,^  or  however  otherwise  bounded  or  described,  and 
be  the  measurements  more  or  less,  —  still  our  country,  to  be 
cherished  in  all  our  hearts,  to  be  defended  by  all  our  hands  I 

This  sentiment,  long  known  as  "  Mr.  Winthrop's 
however-bounded  toast,"  though  received  with  enthu- 
siasm at  the  dinner  just  mentioned,  subsequently  gave 
rise  to  strong  expressions  of  dissent  in  antislavery 
quarters,  being  stigmatized  as  neither  more  nor  less 
than  the  revolting  doctrine  of  "  Our  country,  right  or 

*  After  the  lapse  of  more  than  half  a  century  it  may  perhaps  be 
well  to  explain  that  the  river  Sabine  was  then  the  southwestern  bound- 
ary of  the  United  States ;  the  river  St.  John  being  then,  as  now,  its 
northeastern  boundary. 


4:6  A  MEMOIR   OF 

wrong."  In  the  opinion  of  its  author,  however,  it 
breathed  a  spirit  of  exalted  patriotism,  and  in  after- 
life he  always  referred  to  it  with  peculiar  satisfaction. 

In  the  autumn  of  1845  he  made  a  variety  of  minor 
speeches,  political  and  otherwise,  besides  delivering,  on 
the  15th  of  October,  at  the  Twenty-fifth  Anniversary  of 
the  Boston  Mercantile  Library  Association,  a  carefully 
prepared  lecture  on  the  Influence  of  Commerce,  which 
attained  a  wide  circulation  in  pamphlet  form.  Upon 
the  reassembling  of  Congress  he  offered,  on  the  19th 
of  December,  the  following  resolutions  in  favor  of 
arbitration :  — 

Besolved^  That  the  differences  between  the  United  States  and 
Great  Britain,  on  the  subject  of  the  Oregon  Territory,  are  still 
a  fit  subject  for  negotiation  and  compromise,  and  that  satis- 
factory evidence  has  not  yet  been  afforded  that  no  compromise 
which  the  United  States  ought  to  accept  can  be  effected. 

Resolved.  That  it  would  be  a  dishonor  to  the  agfe  in 
which  we  live,  and  in  the  highest  degree  discreditable  to 
both  the  nations  concerned,  if  they  should  suffer  themselves 
to  be  drawn  into  war  upon  a  question  of  no  immediate  or 
practical  interest  to  either  of  them. 

Resolved^  That  if  no  other  mode  for  the  amicable  adjust- 
ment of  this  question  remains,  it  is  due  to  the  principles  of 
civilization  and  Christianity  that  a  resort  to  arbitration 
should  be  had;  and  that  this  government  cannot  relieve 
itself  from  all  responsibility  which  may  follow  the  failure  to 
settle  the  controversy,  while  this  resort  is  still  untried. 

Resolved^  That  arbitration  does  not  necessarily  involve  a 
reference  to  crowned  heads  ;  and  that,  if  a  jealousy  of  such  a 
reference  is  entertained  in  any  quarter,  a  commission  of  able 
and  dispassionate  citizens,  either  from  the  two  countries  con- 
cerned or  from  the  world  at  large,  offers  itself  as  an  obvious 
and  unobjectionable  alternative. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  47 

Much  disturbed  at  the  warlike  attitude  so  generally 
exhibited,  he,  a  fortnight  later  (January  3,  1846),  again 
advocated  arbitration  in  a  speech  from  which  I  quote 
several  opening  sentences  :  — 

My  venerable  colleague  [J.  Q.  Adams]  and  the  Chairman 
of  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Affairs  [C.  J.  Ingersoll]  have 
alluded  to  the  course  pursued  by  them  last  year  and  have 
told  us  that  they  both  voted  for  giving  immediate  notice  to 
Great  Britain  of  our  intention  to  terminate,  at  the  earliest 
day,  what  has  been  called  the  Convention  of  Joint  Occupation. 
Though  a  much  humbler  member  of  this  House,  I  may  be 
permitted  to  allude  to  the  fact  that  I  voted  against  that  pro- 
ceeding last  year,  and  to  add  that  I  intend  to  do  so  again 
now.  ...  I  believe  there  exists  no  difference  of  opinion  that 
if  this  unfortunate  controversy  should  result  in  war,  our 
country,  and  the  rights  of  our  country  on  both  sides  of  the 
Rocky  Mountains,  are  to  be  maintained  and  defended  with 
all  the  power  and  all  the  vigor  we  possess.  I  believe  there  is 
no  difference  of  opinion  that  in  the  state  of  this  controversy 
at  the  present  moment  we  owe  it  ourselves  as  guardians  of 
the  public  safety  to  bestow  something  more  than  ordinary 
attention  upon  our  national  defences  and  to  place  our 
country  in  a  posture  of  preparation  for  meeting  the  worst 
consequences  which  may  befall  it.  .  .  . 

I  am  aware  that  there  are  many  by  whom  dissent  from 
the  extreme  views  which  the  Administration  would  seem 
recently  to  have  adopted  will  be  eagerly  seized  upon  as 
an  evidence  of  a  want  of  what  they  call  patriotism  and 
American  spirit.  I  spurn  all  such  imputations  in  advance. 
Sir,  the  American  spirit  that  is  needed  at  the  present  moment, 
needed  for  our  highest  honor,  needed  for  our  dearest  interests, 
is  that  which  dares  to  confront  the  mad  impulses  of  a  super- 
ficial popular  sentiment,  and  to  appeal  to  the  sober  second 
thoughts  of  moral  and  intelligent  men.  ...  It  is  said,  in 
some  quarters,  that  it  is  not  good  party  policy  to  avow  such 


48  A   MEMOIR   OF 

doctrines ;  that  the  friends  of  the  Administration  desire 
nothing  so  much  as  an  excuse  for  branding  the  Whigs  as 
a  peace  party ;  and  that  the  only  course  for  us  in  the 
minority  to  pursue,  is  to  brag  about  our  readiness  for  war 
with  those  who  brag  the  loudest.  For  myself,  I  utterly  repu- 
diate all  idea  of  party  obligations  or  party  views  in  connec- 
tion with  this  question.  I  scorn  the  suggestion  that  the 
peace  of  my  country  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  mere  pawn  on 
the  political  chess-board,  to  be  perilled  for  any  mere  party- 
triumph.  .  .  ,  No  man,  of  ever  so  extreme  opinions,  has  ven- 
tured yet  to  speak  upon  this  question  without  protesting,  in 
the  roundest  terms,  that  he  was  for  peace.  Even  the  honor- 
able member  from  Illinois,  who  was  for  giving  notice  to  quit 
at  the  earliest  day,  and  for  proceeding  at  once  to  build  forts 
or  stockades,  and  for  asserting  our  exclusive  jurisdiction  over 
the  whole  Oregon  Territory  at  the  very  instant  at  which  the 
twelve  months  should  expire,  was  as  stout  as  any  of  us  for 
preserving  peace.  My  venerable  colleague  [Mr.  Adams], 
too,  from  whom  I  always  differ  with  regret,  but  in  differing 
from  whom  on  the  present  occasion  I  conform  not  more  to 
my  own  conscientious  judgment  than  to  the  opinions  of  my 
constituents  and  of  a  great  majority  of  the  people  of  Massa- 
chusetts, as  I  understand  them,  —  he,  too,  I  am  sure,  even  in 
that  very  torrent  of  eloquent  indignation  which  cost  us  for  a 
moment  the  order  and  dignity  of  the  House,  could  have  had 
nothing  but  the  peace  of  the  country  at  heart.  So  far  as 
peace,  then,  is  concerned,  it  seems  that  we  are  all  agreed. 
'  Only  it  must  be  an  honorable  peace,'  —  that  I  think  is  the 
stereotyped  phrase  of  the  day ;  and  all  our  differences  are 
thus  reduced  to  the  question.  What  constitutes  an  honorable 
peace  ? 

Mr.  Winthrop  then  proceeded  with  an  elaborate 
argument,  closing  his  remarks  with  the  following 
paragraph ;  — 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  49 

But  while  I  am  thus  opposed  to  war  for  Oregon,  or  to  any 
measures  which,  in  my  judgment,  are  likely  to  lead  to  war,  I 
shall  withhold  no  vote  from  any  measure  which  the  friends  of 
the  Administration  may  bring  forward  for  the  defence  of  the 
country.  Whether  the  Bill  be  for  two  regiments  or  for 
twenty  regiments,  it  shall  pass  for  all  me.  To  the  last  file, 
to  the  uttermost  farthing,  which  they  may  require  of  us,  they 
shall  have  men  and  money  for  the  public  protection.  But 
the  responsibility  for  bringing  about  such  a  state  of  things 
shall  be  theirs,  and  theirs  only.  They  can  prevent  it  if  they 
please.  The  peace  of  the  country  and  the  honor  of  the 
country  are  still  entirely  compatible  with  each  other.  The 
Oregon  question  is  still  perfectly  susceptible  of  an  amicable 
adjustment,  and  I  rejoice  to  believe  that  it  may  still  be  so 
adjusted.  We  have  had  omens  of  peace  in  the  other  end  of 
the  Capital,  if  none  in  this.  But  if  war  comes,  the  Admin- 
istration must  take  the  responsibility  for  all  its  guilt  and  all 
its  disgrace ! 

On  the  12th  of  March,  1846,  he  spoke  at  length,  in 
Committee  of  the  Whole,  in  favor  of  River  and  Harbor 
Improvements ;  and  early  in  April  he  had  two  sharp  par- 
liamentary encounters,  —  one  with  Charles  J.  Ingersoll, 
who  had  charged  Webster  with  being  the  pensioner  of 
New  England  manufacturers,  and  with  having  mis- 
applied the  secret-service  funds  of  the  State  Department ; 
the  other  with  William  W.  Payne  of  Alabama,  who 
had  attacked  Massachusetts.  "  The  last-named  passage 
of  arms  was  thus  described  by  an  eye-witness  in  a  letter 
to  the  "  Baltimore  Patriot "  :  — 

"A  warm  debate  sprang  up  on  a  bill  respecting  the  con- 
tingent fund,  and  some  carte  and  tierce  operations  took  place 
between  Mr.  Winthrop  and  Mr.  Payne,  which  created  quite  a 
sensation.     You  must  know  that  the  former  is  one  of  the 

4 


50  A  MEMOIR   OF 

most  courteous  gentlemen,  as  well  as  finished  orators,  in  the 
House.  You  must  also  know  that  Mr.  Payne  is  a  large,  not 
over-polished,  blunt  sort  of  man,  who  fears  nobody,  and 
says  just  what  he  chooses  in  anything  but  a  pleasant 
voice  or  conciliatory  manner.  To-day  he  lashed  himself  into 
a  storm  similar  to  that  which  was  raging  at  the  time  outside 
the  Capitol,  and  aimed  some  ponderous  blows  at  the  New 
England  States  in  general,  and  Massachusetts  in  particular, 
for  aiding  the  enemy,  etc.,  during  the  War  of  1812.  Mr. 
Winthrop  replied  with  great  spirit  and  eloquence,  showing 
that  Massachusetts  furnished  more  and  better  men  in  the 
last  war  than  any  other  State  in  the  Union.  Mr.  Payne  re- 
ferred to  a  resolution  of  the  Massachusetts  Legislature,  and 
asked  Mr.  Winthrop  if  he  could  point  to  a  single  instance 
where  a  citizen  of  the  Southwest  had  turned  traitor.  Mr. 
Winthrop,  with  great  energy  and  appositeness,  exclaimed, 
'  I  reciprocate  the  gentleman's  inquiry.'  As  for  himself,  he 
added,  he  was  hardly  old  enough  to  recall  all  the  incidents  of 
that  war  in  his  section  of  the  country,  but  he  well  remem- 
bered clambering  to  a  window-casement  which  overlooked 
Boston  Common  to  see  a  parade  of  soldiers  about  marching 
to  the  defence  of  their  country ;  and  as  to  the  resolution  re- 
ferred to,  the  gentleman  from  Alabama  might  be  pleased  to 
know  that  it  had  subsequently  been  expunged.  The  scene 
was  a  highly  entertaining  one,  and  all  who  witnessed  it 
agreed  that  Mr.  Winthrop  did  not  come  off  second-best." 

On  the  25th  of  June,  1846,  he  made  still  another 
tariff  speech,  which  he  entitled  The  Wants  of  the  Gov- 
ernment and  the  Wages  of  Labor.  Meantime  the  Ad- 
ministration had  succeeded  not  merely  in  picking  a 
quarrel  with  Mexico,  but  (with  the  aid  of  the  Demo- 
cratic majority  of  the  House)  in  creating  a  schism  in 
the  Whig  party.  The  little  army  of  General  Taylor 
being  in  great  danger,  a  Bill  was  hurriedly  introduced, 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  51 

on  the  11th  of  May,  to  authorize  the  employment  of 
vohmteers,  and  into  this  Bill  was  inserted  in  committee 
a  preamble,  stating  that  war  existed  "by  the  Act  of 
Mexico."  Every  Whig  in  Congress  believed  that  it 
existed  by  the  Act  of  James  K.  Polk  and  William  L. 
Marcy,  but  after  vainly  endeavoring  to  expunge  the 
preamble,  it  was  decided  to  vote  for  the  Bill,  preamble 
and  all,  rather  than  seem  to  refuse  succor  to  a  United 
States  army  in  distress.  The  vote  stood  174  to  14,  the 
majority  including  such  Northern  Whigs  as  Samuel  F. 
Vinton  and  Robert  C.  Schenck  of  Ohio,  Robert  C. 
Winthrop  of  Massachusetts,  Solomon  Foot  and  George 
P.  Marsh  of  Vermont,  William  A.  Moseley  of  New 
York,  Joseph  R.  Ingersoll,  James  Pollock  and  Alex- 
ander Ramsay  of  Pennsylvania,  with  many  others. 
The  minority  included  John  Quincy  Adams  and  four 
other  representatives  from  Massachusetts.  That  two 
Whig  members  from  the  Old  Bay  State,  one  of  them  so 
prominent  a  man  as  Mr.  Winthrop,  should,  no  matter 
under  what  circumstances,  have  accorded  a  qualified 
assent  to  war  with  Mexico,  created  a  great  outcry.  He 
himself  believed  that  the  question  was  one  on  which  it 
was  impossible  to  give  an  altogether  satisfactory  vote, 
and  concerning  which  conscientious  men  might  well 
arrive  at  opposite  opinions.  "I  have,"  said  he  at  the 
time,  "  nothing  but  respect  for  the  motives,  and  sym- 
pathy in  the  general  views,  of  those  of  my  colleagues 
who  differed  with  me  on  this  occasion."  ^     Agencies  for 

1  There  is  quite  a  literature  to  be  consulted  on  this  subject,  and  any 
reader  who  may  be  disposed  to  go  into  it  at  length  would  do  well  to  look 
up  a  pamphlet  by  the  late  George  Ticknor  Curtis,  entitled  "  Mr.  Win- 
throp's  Vote  on  the  War  Bill."  See  also  the  first  volume  of  Wheeler's 
History  of  Congress,  and  a  letter  in  Damon's  Life  of  Abraham  Lincoln, 


52  A  MEMOIR   OF 

the  supply  of  press-cuttings  did  not  tlien  exist,  and 
public  men  were  often  in  ignorance  of  what  was  said 
of  them,  whether  of  praise  or  blame.  It  thus  hap- 
pened that  it  was  not  until  long  after  the  vote  in 
question  that  Mr.  Winthrop's  attention  was  drawn  to 
severe  attacks  upon  him  by  an  anonymous  newspaper 
writer  who  was  believed  to  be  Charles  Sumner.  The 
latter  was  not  one  of  his  early  friends,  but  they  had 
seen  a  good  deal  of  one  another  since  Mr.  Winthrop 
entered  Congress,  Mr.  Sumner  being  one  of  his  constitu- 
ents and  in  the  habit  of  writing  from  time  to  time  on 
public  questions.  A  difference  of  opinion  between  them 
had  manifested  itself  more  than  a  year  before,  when 
Mr.  Sumner,  in  his  Fourth  of  July  oration  on  the 
"  True  Grandeur  of  Nations,"  had  taken  occasion,  in 
denouncing  war,  to  make  a  good  deal  of  fun  of  the 
militia.  Mr.  Winthrop,  on  the  other  hand,  had  been  in 
his  day  an  enthusiastic  militiaman,  two  of  his  elder 
brothers  having  commanded  brigades  and  he  himself  a 
company.  He  fully  believed  the  Massachusetts  Militia 
to  be  not  merely  a  bulwark  of  law  and  order,  but  a  good 
training-school  for  young  men ;  and  he  strongly  depre- 
cated passages  in  the  oration,  which  Mr.  Sumner  con- 
sented to  modify.  Not  to  be  outdone  in  frankness,  the 
latter  took  occasion  to  confess  that  he  had  listened  to 
Mr.  Winthrop's  "  however-bounded  "  toast  with  a  pang, 
and  that  he  would  have  cut  off  his  right  hand  rather 
than  utter  a  sentiment  which  placed  country  above 
right  .^    This  little  interchange  of  criticism  did  not  affect 

who,  though  not  a  member  of  Congress  of  the  time,  fully  approved  the 
course  pursued  by  the  majority  of  the  Whigs. 

1  He  subsequently  styled  it  "an  epigram  of  dishonest  patriotism." 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  53 

their  intercourse,  and  only  a  few  weeks  before  the 
passage  of  the  War  Bill  Mr.  Winthrop  had  received  a 
friendly  letter  from  Mr.  Sumner.  He  was  therefore 
quite  unprepared  for  what  seemed  to  him  the  un- 
accountably virulent  tone  of  these  anonymous  news- 
paper attacks,  and,  conceiving  that  both  his  words  and 
acts  had  been  misrepresented  and  perverted,  he  became 
very  angry.  Just  at  this  time  he  received  a  letter  from 
Mr.  Sumner  avowing  the  authorship  of  the  articles, 
claiming  that  he  had  acted  only  in  the  conscientious 
discharge  of  public  duty,  asserting  that  persons  of  the 
highest  consideration  in  Boston  were  of  opinion  that 
Mr.  Winthrop  "  ought  to  be  rebuked,"  but  hoping  that 
their  pleasant  relations  might  not  be  interrupted. 
These  explanations,  however  well  intended,  did  not 
appease  Mr.  Winthrop's  wrath,  and  in  the  Appendix  to 
the  first  volume  of  his  "  Addresses  and  Speeches  "  will 
be  found  a  letter  from  him  to  Mr.  Sumner,  dated 
August  17, 1846,  from  which  I  quote  a  few  sentences  : 

I  am  willing  to  believe  that  you  have  not  weighed  the 
force  of  your  own  phrases.  Your  jpericulosa  facilitas  has  be- 
trayed you.  Your  habitual  indulgence  in  strains  of  extrava- 
gant thought  and  exaggerated  expression,  alike  when  you 
praise  and  when  you  censure,  has  perhaps  impaired  your 
discrimination  in  the  employment  of  language.  ...  I  write 
for  no  purpose  of  returning  railing  for  railing.  I  am  quite 
ready  to  forgive  the  injury  you  have  done  me,  and  I  shall 
wish  you  nothing  but  success  and  happiness  in  your  future 
career.  But  were  I  to  maintain  relations  of  social  intercourse 
(as  you  propose)  with  one  who  has  thus  grossly  assailed  my 
public  morality,  it  would  be  an  admission  of  the  truth  of  one 
of  the  charges  which  has  been  arraj^ed  against  me  in  this 
case.     It  might  fairly  be  construed  into  an  acknowledgment 


54  A   MEMOIR   OF 

that  I  recognized  different  rules  of  action  for  my  private  and 
my  political  life.  I  feel  compelled,  therefore,  to  decline  all 
further  communication  or  conference  while  matters  stand  as 
they  now  do  between  us.  I  am  conscious  of  having  done 
nothing  inconsistent  with  the  cause  of  Freedom,  of  Right,  of 
Humanity,  of  Truth,  and  even  of  Peace.  I  yield  to  no  one 
in  my  attachment  to  one  and  all  of  those  great  interests.  I 
am  no  stranger,  either,  to  those  Christian  Churches  from 
which  one  of  your  articles  would  seem  to  excommunicate  me ; 
nor  do  I  know  anything  in  my  moral  or  religious  character 
which  should  fairly  subject  me  to  be  schooled,  even  by  your- 
self. If  by  any  vote  I  have  given  I  have  wounded  the  con- 
science of  anybody  else,  I  sincerely  regret  it.  I  certainly 
have  not  wounded  my  own  conscience.  ...  I  ask  no  man  to 
vindicate  my  vote,  or  to  agree  with  me  in  opinion.  I  blame 
no  man  for  charging  me  with  error  of  judgment.  But,  know- 
ing for  myself  that  my  vote  was  given  honestly,  conscien- 
tiously, with  a  sincere  belief  that  it  was  the  best  vote  which 
an  arbitrary  and  overbearing  majority  would  permit  us  to 
give,  I  shall  allow  no  man  to  cast  scandalous  imputations  on 
my  motives  and  apply  base  epithets  to  my  acts  in  public,  and 
to  call  me  his  friend  in  private.  My  hand  is  not  at  the  ser- 
vice of  any  one  who  has  denounced  it  with  such  ferocity  as 
being  stained  with  blood. 

It  is  not  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  Mr.  Winthrop's 
course  in  this  matter  may  have  been  somewhat  influ- 
enced by  letters  which  he  received  in  Washington  from 
friends  in  Boston,  who  imputed  to  Mr.  Sumner  a  secret 
thirst  for  office  and  accused  him  of  a  deliberate  scheme 
to  supplant  Mr.  Winthrop  in  the  future.  These  repre- 
sentations may  have  done  the  subject  of  them  great 
injustice.  The  last  thing  I  should  desire  in  a  memoir 
like  this  would  be  to  seem  to  cast  reflections  upon  a 
very   distinguished   man   who  subsequently   became  a 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  55 

member  of  this  Society.  It  would,  however,  be  an 
impossibility  to  deal  with  Mr.  Winthrop's  career,  with- 
out briefly  describing,  from  his  own  point  of  view,  an 
unfortunate  quarrel  which  became  part  of  the  political 
history  of  that  period  and  was  far-reaching  in  its  con- 
sequences. Mr.  Sumner  s  side  of  it  will  be  found  stated 
at  length  in  the  exhaustive  Life  of  him  by  our  associate, 
Edward  L.  Pierce,  who,  while  warmly  sympathizing 
with  his  hero,  as  it  is  only  natural  he  should  do,  has 
yet  exhibited  towards  Mr.  Winthrop  a  marked  degree 
of  courtesy.  With  one  remark  of  his  I  entirely  agree, 
where  he  points  out  that  the  latter  had  "  passed  from 
his  studies  to  public  station,  and  was  naturally  more 
sensitive  to  criticism  than  if  he  had  undergone  the 
discipline  and  friction  of  a  profession."  No  one  at  all 
intimate  with  Mr.  Winthrop  would  have  been  disposed 
to  deny  that  his  temperament  was  a  sensitive  one,  that 
his  feelings  could  readily  be  hurt  and  his  resentment 
sometimes  be  aroused,  by  a  belief  that  he  had  been 
treated  with  unfairness.  His  participation  in  party  war- 
fare had  been  hitherto  confined  to  encounters  with  the 
hereditary  opponents  of  a  Conservative.  He  now  first 
experienced  the  sensation  of  a  fire  in  the  rear  from  his 
own  ranks,  —  a  fire  renewed  in  succeeding  years  from 
very  unexpected  quarters.  If  he  could  not  altogether 
conceal  that  he  sometimes  found  it  galling,  he  certainly 
tried  hard  to  exhibit,  upon  some  notable  occasions,  a 
degree  of  Christian  forbearance  not  often  met  with  in 
a  politician.-^ 

^  As  an  instance  of  this,  I  may  mention  that  Mr.  Sumner  had  written 
him  that  his  letter  to  the  "  Courier  "  had  received  "  the  entire  approba- 
tion "  of  the  editor,  Joseph  T.  Buckingham.  Mr.  Winthrop's  colleague, 
George  Ashraun,  who  had  voted  against  the  War  Bill,  but  who  had 


56  A  MEMOIR   OF 

In  consequence  of  the  attacks  then  made  upon  him, 
he  abandoned  his  former  purpose  of  not  being  again  a 
candidate  for  Congress,  and  accepted  a  new  nomination 
in  order  that  his  conduct  might  be  passed  upon  by  his 
constituents.  This  time  he  had  not  merely  a  Demo- 
cratic competitor  to  contend  with,  but  also  a  candidate 
of  the  disaffected  members  of  his  own  party,  "Con- 
science-Whigs," as  they  were  then  often  styled.  The 
result  was  his  triumphant  return,  the  vote  standing : 
Winthrop,  5,980  ;  all  others,  3,372. 

In  the  canvass  immediately  preceding  this  election 
he  preferred  not  to  notice  an  open  letter  from  Mr. 
Sumner  to  himself,  dated  Oct.  25,  1846,  and  circulated 
as  a  campaign  document.  It  embodied  the  substance 
of  the  original  charges  and  may  be  found  in  the  col- 
lected works  of  its  author.  In  an  elaborate  speech, 
entitled  Whig  Predictions  and  Whig  Policy,  delivered 
by  him  in  the  Whig  State  Convention  in  Faneuil  Hall 
a  few  weeks  earlier  (Sept.  23,  1846)  he  made  the  fol- 
lowing allusion  to  what  had  taken  place  :  — 

I  do  not  forget  that  in  regard  to  some  incidental  questions 
connected  with  this  war  there  have  been  differences  of 
opinion  among  friends  at  home,  and  differences  of  votes 
among  friends  at  Washington.  Upon  these  topics  of  con- 
troversy, however,  I  do  not  intend  to  touch.     If  anybody 

regretted  the  tone  of  the  letter  in  question,  subsequently  asked  Buck- 
ingham why  he  had  printed  such  oifensive  expressions.  Buckingham 
replied  that  they  were  not  in  the  copy  approved  by  him,  but  were 
interpolated  in  the  printing-room  without  his  knowledge,  and  he  forth- 
with wrote  Mr.  Winthrop  in  explanation,  offering  to  produce  the  origi- 
nal proof  with  additions  in  Mr.  Sumner's  handwriting.  Mr.  Winthrop 
was  urged  to  make  Buckingham's  letter  public,  but  he  declined  to  do  so 
on  the  ground  that  Mr.  Sumner  must  have  forgotten  that  Buckingham 
did  not  see  the  revised  proof,  and  that  he  had  no  wish  to  take  advantage 
of  a  lapse  of  memory. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  57 

has  come  here,  either  by  direct  expression  or  by  covert 
allusion,  to  cast  imputations,  to  provoke  collisions,  or  to  stir 
up  strife,  I  pass  him  by,  with  whatever  respect  other  people 
may  think  him  entitled  to.  We  are  assembled  here  to 
remember  our  agreements  and  not  our  differences.  We  have 
come  here  to  reconcile  all  differences,  and  to  do  what  we  can 
to  sustain  and  advance  our  common  principles  and  our 
common  objects.  .  .  . 

Sir,  I  trust  there  is  no  man  here  who  is  not  ready  to  stand 
by  the  Constitution  of  the  Country.  I  trust  there  is  no  man 
here  who  is  not  willing  to  hold  fast  to  the  Union  of  the 
States,  be  its  limits  ultimately  fixed  a  little  on  one  side,  or  a 
little  on  the  other  side,  of  the  line  of  his  own  choice.  For 
myself,  I  will  not  contemplate  the  idea  of  the  dissolution  of 
the  Union  in  any  conceivable  event.  There  are  no  bound- 
aries of  sea  or  land,  of  rock  or  river,  of  desert  or  mountain, 
to  which  I  will  not  try  at  least  to  carry  out  my  love  of 
country,  whenever  they  shall  really  be  the  boundaries  of  my 
country.  If  the  day  of  dissolution  ever  comes,  it  shall  bring 
the  evidence  of  its  own  irresistible  necessity  with  it.  I  avert 
my  eyes  from  all  recognition  of  such  a  necessity  in  the 
distance.  Nor  am  I  ready  for  any  political  organizations  or 
platforms  less  broad  and  comprehensive  than  those  which 
may  include  and  uphold  the  whole  Whig  party  of  the  United 
States.  But  all  this  is  consistent,  and  shall,  in  my  own  case, 
practically  consist  with  a  just  sense  of  the  evils  of  slavery ; 
with  an  earnest  opposition  to  everything  designed  to  prolong 
or  extend  it ;  with  a  firm  resistance  to  all  its  encroachments 
on  Northern  rights ;  and,  above  all,  with  an  uncompromising 
hostility  to  all  measures  for  introducing  new  slave  States  and 
new  slave  territories  into  our  Union.^ 

In  December,  1846,  the  merchants  of  Philadelphia 
entertained  Mr.  Webster  at  a  formal   public  banquet, 

1  Henry  Wilson  characterized  this  speech  as  "able,  adroit,  and  elo- 
quent."    See  "  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power,"  vol.  ii.  p.  119. 


58  A  MEMOIR  OF 

which  Mr.  Winthrop,  then  on  his  way  to  Washington, 
attended  as  an  invited  guest,  but  without  expectation 
of  taking  any  part.  He  was,  however,  called  upon,  and 
a  correspondent  of  the  "  Boston  Journal "  paid  him  the 
following  compliment :  — 

"  Mr.  Winthrop  was  exceedingly  happy  in  his  remarks.  I 
have  listened  to  him  in  Faneuil  Hall  and  other  places,  but  I 
never  before  heard  him  speak  with  such  spirit,  force,  and  elo- 
quence. Alluding  to  Mr.  Webster,  he  said  Massachusetts 
could  not  claim  him  by  birth,  that  honor  belonging  to  New 
Hampshire ;  but  there  was  honor  enough  in  him  for  two 
States,  —  yes,  enough  for  six  and  twenty  States !  When  he 
closed,  nine  cheers  were  given,  all  standing,  for  Massachusetts 
and  Winthrop!" 

A  few  weeks  later,  on  the  8th  of  January,  1847, 
he  delivered  a  carefully  prepared  speech  on  the  war 
with  Mexico.  In  the  course  of  it,  after  quoting  a 
passage  from  the  Writings  of  Madison,  he  continued 
as  follows :  — 

Much  has  been  said  in  the  course  of  this  debate  about  old- 
fashioned  Federalism,  but  here  are  the  doctrines  of  old-fash- 
ioned Democracy,  in  the  very  language  of  one  of  its  ablest 
and  most  honored  masters.  And  how  strangely  do  they  con- 
trast with  the  manifestoes  of  that  modern  brood,  which  boast 
themselves  so  vaingloriously  of  their  borrowed  plumes !  In 
which  one  of  these  golden  sentences  of  James  Madison  do 
you  find  any  justification  of  the  idea  that  the  Executive  De- 
partment of  the  government  is  to  be  implicitly  trusted  in  time 
of  war,  and  that  the  vigilance  of  Congress  is  to  suffer  itself 
to  be  lulled  asleep  by  the  insipid  opiate  of  a  President's  Mes- 
sage ?  What  can  be  more  emphatic  than  the  declaration  that 
'those  who  are  to  conduct  a  war  cannot,  in  the  nature  of 
things,  be  proper  or  safe  judges  whether  a  war  ought  to  be 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  59 

commenced,  continued,  or  concluded '  ?  Who  can  read  these 
paragraphs  without  being  deeply  impressed  by  the  sentiment 
which  pervades  them,  that  if  the  true  spirit  of  Democracy 
calls  upon  us  ever  to  be  jealous,  with  an  exceeding  jealousy, 
of  Executive  power,  it  is  when  that  power  has  been  armed 
with  the  fearful  prerogative  of  war,  and  when,  as  now,  that 
prerogative  is  masked  behind  '  a  symbol  of  peace '  ?  If  the 
Democratic  sensibilities  of  James  Madison  were  startled  and 
shocked  when  George  Washington,  that  'prodigy  of  many 
centuries,'  as  he  well  entitled  him,  thought  fit  to  forestall  the 
deliberations  of  Congress  by  issuing  a  proclamation  of  neu- 
trality, what  would  he  have  said  had  he  lived  to  see  a  Presi- 
dent '  such  as  may  be  expected  in  the  ordinary  successions  of 
Magistracy,'  not  merely  involving  the  country  in  war  by  his 
own  arts,  but  proceeding  to  stigmatize  as  traitors  all  who 
may  think  fit  to  inquire  into  the  causes  of  the  war,  or  to 
judge  for  themselves  whether  it  ought  to  be  continued  or 
concluded.  .  .  . 

As  to  the  origin  of  the  war,  I  shall  say  but  few  words.  It 
should  never  be  forgotten  that  its  primary  cause  was  the 
annexation  of  Texas,  —  a  measure  pressed  upon  the  country, 
by  its  peculiar  advocates,  with  the  view  of  strengthening, 
extending,  and  perpetuating  the  institution  of  domestic  sla- 
very. Sir,  I  cherish  no  feelings  of  ill-will  towards  Texas. 
Now  that  she  is  a  member  of  our  Union,  I  should  speak  of 
her  in  the  terms  which  belong  to  the  intercourse  of  sister 
States.  But  I  cannot  fail  to  speak  plainly  in  regard  to  the 
unconstitutional  act  of  her  annexation  and  the  disastrous  con- 
sequences which  have  thus  far  attended  it.  Who  forgets  the 
glowing  terms  in  which  the  addition  of  that  lone  star  ^  to  our 
American  constellation  was  heralded  ?  How  much  of  prosper- 
ity and  of  peace,  of  protection  to  our  labor  and  of  defence  to 
our  land,  was  augured  from  it  I  Who  can  now  reflect  on  its 
consequences  as  already  developed,  who  can  think  of  the 

1  The  Texan  flag  bore  a  single  star,  and  she  was  often  called  the 
Lone  Star  State. 


60  A  MEMOIR   OF 

deep  wound  which,  in  the  judgment  of  many,  it  has  inflicted 
on  our  Constitution;  of  the  alienations  and  heart-burnings 
which  it  has  produced  among  different  members  of  the 
Union ;  of  the  fearful  looking-for  of  disunion  which  it  has 
excited ;  of  the  treasure  it  has  cost  and  the  precious  lives  it 
has  wasted,  in  the  war  now  in  progress  ;  of  the  poison  it  has 
in  so  many  ways  mingled  with  the  previously  healthful  cur- 
rent of  our  national  career,  —  who  can  reflect  on  all  this 
without  being  reminded  of  another  lone  star,  which  '  fell 
from  heaven,  becoming  as  it  were  a  lamp,  and  it  fell  upon 
the  third  part  of  the  rivers,  and  upon  the  fountains  of  waters, 
and  the  name  of  the  star  is  called  Wormwood,  and  the  third 
part  of  the  waters  became  wormwood,  and  many  men  died  of 
the  waters  because  they  were  bitter.'  ^ 

After  proceeding  to  denounce  the  unwarrantable  acts 
of  the  Executive  and  maintaining  that  an  honorable 
peace  need  involve  no  dismemberment  of  Mexico,  he 
continued  as  follows :  — 

I  am  not  about  to  depreciate  the  desirableness  to  the  com- 
merce of  our  country  of  a  good  harbor  or  two  on  the  Pacific 
Ocean.  If  a  strip  of  California  could  be  added  to  our  Oregon 
possessions,  under  proper  circumstances  and  with  the  general 
consent  of  the  country,  I  should  be  one  of  the  last  persons  to 
object  to  it.  But  the  idea  that  it  is  worthy  of  us  to  take  ad- 
vantage of  this  war  to  wrest  it  from  Mexico  by  force  of  arms, 
and  to  protract  the  war  until  she  will  consent  to  cede  it  to  us 
by  a  treaty  of  peace,  I  utterly  repudiate.  .  .  . 

I  have  no  time  to  discuss  the  subject  of  slavery  on  this 
occasion,  nor  should  I  desire  to  discuss  it  in  this  connection, 
if  I  had  more  time.  But  I  must  not  omit  a  few  plain  words 
on  the  momentous  issue  which  has  now  been  raised.  I  speak 
for  Massachusetts  —  I  believe  I  speak  the  sentiments  of  all 
New  England,  and  of  many  other  States  out  of  New  England 
^  Revelation  viii.  10,  11. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  61 

—  when  1  say  that,  upon  this  question,  our  minds  are  made 
up.  So  far  as  we  have  power  —  constitutional  or  moral 
power  —  to  control  political  events,  we  are  resolved  that 
there  shall  be  no  further  extension  of  the  territory  of  this 
Union  subject  to  the  institutions  of  slavery.  This  is  not  a 
matter  to  argue  about  with  us.  My  honorable  friend  from 
Georgia  [Mr.  Toombs]  must  pardon  me  if  I  do  not  enter  into 
any  question  with  him  whether  such  a  policy  be  equal  or 
just.  It  may  be  that  the  North  does  not  consider  the  insti- 
tution of  slavery  a  fit  thing  to  be  the  subject  of  equal  distri- 
bution or  nice  weighing  in  the  balances.  I  cannot  agree 
with  him  that  the  South  gains  nothing  by  the  Constitution 
but  the  right  to  reclaim  fugitives.  Surely  he  has  forgotten 
that  slavery  is  the  basis  of  representation  in  this  House.  But 
I  do  not  intend  to  argue  the  case.  I  wish  to  deal  with  it 
calmly  but  explicitly.  I  believe  the  North  is  ready  to  stand 
by  the  Constitution,  with  all  its  compromises,  as  it  now  is.  I 
do  not  intend,  moreover,  to  throw  out  any  threats  of  disunion, 
whatever  may  be  the  result.  I  do  not  intend  now  or  ever,  to 
contemplate  disunion  as  a  cure  for  any  imaginable  evil.  At 
the  same  time  I  do  not  intend  to  be  driven  from  a  firm  ex- 
pression of  purpose,  and  a  steadfast  adherence  to  principle, 
by  any  threats  of  disunion  from  any  other  quarter.  The  peo- 
ple of  New  England  whom  I  have  the  privilege  to  speak  for, 
do  not  desire,  as  I  understand  their  views  —  I  know  my  own 
heart  and  my  own  principles  and  can  at  least  speak  for  them 

—  to  gain  one  foot  of  territory  by  conquest,  and  as  the  result 
of  the  prosecution  of  the  war  with  Mexico.  I  do  not  believe 
that  even  the  Abolitionists  of  the  North  —  though  I  am  one 
of  the  last  persons  who  would  be  entitled  to  speak  their  sen- 
timents—  would  be  unwilling  to  be  found  in  combination 
with  Southern  gentlemen  who  may  see  fit  to  espouse  this 
doctrine.  We  desire  peace.  We  believe  that  this  war  ought 
never  to  have  been  begun,  and  we  do  not  wish  to  have  it  made 
the  pretext  for  plundering  Mexico  of  one  foot  of  her  lands. 
But  if  the  war  is  to  be  prosecuted,  and  if  territories  are  to  be 


62  A  MEMOIR  OF 

conquered  and  annexed,  we  shall  stand  fast  and  forever  to  the 
principle  that,  so  far  as  we  are  concerned,  these  territories  shall 
be  the  exclusive  abode  of  freemen. 

On  the  22d  of  February,  1847,  the  Army  Bill  being 
under  consideration  in  Committee  of  the  Whole,  Mr. 
Winthrop  moved  several  provisos  to  the  first  clause  in 
order  to  limit  the  control  of  the  Executive  over  the 
appropriations,  and  he  supported  his  views  in  a  speech 
of  some  length,  entitled  the  Conquest  of  Mexican  Ter- 
ritory, from  which  I  quote  briefly  as  follows  :  — 

I  am  ready  now  and  at  all  times  to  unite  in  maintaining  the 
National  credit.  I  do  not  desire  to  see  the  evils  of  an  odious 
war  multiplied  and  aggravated  by  disordered  finances  and  a 
bankrupt  Treasury.  If  our  armies  are  to  be  kept  afoot, 
wherever  they  may  be,  and  in  whatever  numbers  they  may 
be,  I  am  for  having  money  enough  in  the  Treasury  for  feed- 
ing them,  and  clothing  them,  and  paying  them.  I  am  for 
paying  men,  too,  if  possible,  not  with  depreciated  paper,  but 
in  a  sound,  redeemable  currency.  I  desire  to  leave  the  Ad- 
ministration no  apology  or  pretence  for  supporting  our  troops 
by  a  system  of  pillage  and  plunder  in  the  enemy's  country. 
There  are  purposes  of  peace,  too,  which  require  money. 
There  are  just  debts  to  be  paid,  important  establishments  to 
be  supported,  cherished  institutions  to  be  maintained,  noble 
charities  to  be  administered ;  and  the  Treasury  must  be  sup- 
plied to  meet  the  requirements  of  them  all.  With  these  views 
I  voted  for  the  Loan  Bill.  I  believed  it  to  be  a  necessary  pro- 
vision for  sustaining  the  public  credit.  .  .  . 

I  voted  for  the  Three  Million  Bill  because  I  wished  to  get 
the  great  principle  which  the  proviso  embodied  fairly  upon 
the  Statute-book.  1  I  believe  it  to  be  a  perfectly  constitutional 
principle  and  an  eminently  conservative  principle.  I  believe 
that  whenever  the  principle  of  this  proviso  shall  be  irrevoca- 
1  The  Wilmot  Proviso. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  63 

bly  established,  shall  be  considered  as  unchangeable  as  the 
laws  of  the  Medes  and  Persians,  then,  and  not  till  then,  shall 
we  have  permanent  peace  with  other  countries  and  fixed 
boundaries  for  our  own  country.  .  .  .  Much  as  I  deplore  the 
war  in  which  we  are  involved,  —  deeply  as  I  regret  the  whole 
policy  of  annexation,  —  if  the  result  of  these  measures  should 
be  to  engraft  the  policy  of  this  proviso  permanently  and  ine- 
radicably  upon  our  American  system,  I  should  regard  it  as  a 
blessing  cheaply  purchased.  ...  If  we  could  at  last  lay  down 
permanently  the  boundaries  of  our  Republic  ;  if  we  could  feel 
that  we  had  extinguished  forever  the  lust  of  extended  domin- 
ion in  the  bosoms  of  the  American  people ;  if  we  could  pre- 
sent that  old  god.  Terminus,  of  whom  we  have  heard  such 
eloquent  mention  elsewhere,  not  with  outstretched  arm  still 
pointing  to  new  territories  in  the  distance,  but  with  limbs 
lopped  off,  as  the  Romans  sometimes  represented  him,  be- 
tokening that  he  had  reached  his  very  furthest  goal ;  if  we 
could  be  assured  that  our  limits  were  to  be  no  farther  ad- 
vanced, either  by  purchase  or  conquest,  by  fraud  or  by  force, 
—  then,  then,  we  might  feel  that  we  had  taken  a  bond  of  fate 
for  the  perpetuation  of  our  Union.  It  is  in  this  spirit  that  I 
voted  for  the  proviso  in  the  Three  Million  Bill.  It  is  in  this 
spirit  that  I  offer  the  third  proviso  to  the  Thirty  Million  Bill 
before  us.  Pass  them  both;  cut  off,  by  one  and  the  same 
stroke,  all  idea  both  of  the  extension  of  slavery  and  the  ex- 
tension of  territory;  and  we  shall  need  neither  the  three 
millions  nor  the  thirty  millions  for  securing  peace  and  har- 
mony, both  at  home  and  abroad. 

The  third  proviso  then  moved  by  Mr.  Winthrop  was 
as  follows :  — 

Provided^  further.  That  these  appropriations  are  made 
with  no  view  of  sanctioning  any  prosecution  of  the  existing 
war  with  Mexico  for  the  acquisition  of  territory  to  form  new 
States  to  be  added  to  the  Union,  or  for  the  dismemberment 
in  any  way  of  the  Republic  of  Mexico. 


64  A  MEMOIR   OF 

It  was  defeated  by  a  strict  party  vote  of  124  to  76, 
the  minority  including  Toombs  and  Stephens  of  Georgia 
with  other  Southern  Whigs. 

IV. 

The  Twenty-ninth  Congress  expired  March  4,  1847, 
when  Mr.  Winthrop  dismissed  politics  from  his  thoughts 
and  made  haste  to  sail  for  Europe,  —  a  trip  he  had  long 
had  in  view,  but  either  domestic  engagements  or  public 
duties  had  hitherto  interfered  with  it.  He  had  friends 
and  relatives  both  in  England  and  France,  and  he  took 
with  him  flattering  letters  of  introduction  from  Mr. 
Webster  and  Mr.  Everett,  which  made  his  first  experi- 
ence of  London  society  an  exceptionally  agreeable  one. 
In  a  fragment  of  autobiography  privately  printed  by 
him  not  long  before  his  death  and  now  to  be  found  in 
many  public  libraries,^  he  gave  some  account  of  his 
intercourse  with  European  celebrities  at  different  peri- 
ods, and  it  need  only  be  mentioned  here  that  among 
the  persons  of  distinction  of  whom  he  was  privileged 
to  see  a  good  deal  in  1847  were  the  Duke  of  Welling- 
ton, Sir  Robert  Peel,  the  poet  Rogers,  the  historians 
Thiers,  Mignet,  Milman,  Thirlwall  and  Hallam,  Arch- 
bishop Whately,  Bishops  Wilberforce  and  Blomfield, 
Lord  Lansdowne  (then  President  of  the  Council)  Lords 
Aberdeen  and  Stanley  (both  afterward  prime  ministers) 
Prince  Louis  Napoleon  (then  in  exile  in  London),  and 
King  Louis  Philippe,  who  twice  received  Mr.  Winthrop 
informally  at  Neuilly. 

^  A  Fragment  of  Autobiography,  Reminiscences  of  Foreign  Travel, 
by  Robert  C.  Winthrop.     Privately  printed,  1894. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  65 

He  had  hardly  returned  home  before  he  was  called 
upon  to  attend  the  Whig  State  Convention  at  Worcester 
on  the  29th  of  September,  where  a  vigorous  effort  was 
made  by  the  Conscience-¥/higs  to  commit  the  party  to 
a  positive  pledge  to  support  no  Presidential  candidate 
who  was  not  openly  opposed  to  the  extension  of  slavery. 
From  Mr.  Winthrop's  point  of  view,  the  only  practical 
effect  of  such  a  platform  Avould  have  been  to  make  a 
breach  in  the  Conservative  party  as  a  national  organi- 
zation, thereby  facilitating  the  election  of  a  Democratic 
President,  certain  to  be  more  obnoxious  than  any  South- 
ern Whig.  In  the  debate  which  ensued,  the  amendment 
was  ably  advocated  by  Charles  Francis  Adams,  Allen, 
Sumner,  and  others,  while  Mr.  Winthrop  was  almost 
alone  in  opposition  to  it.^  He  was  obliged  to  speak 
more  than  once  and  with  great  earnestness,  but  in  the 
end  he  carried  his  point.  Rarely  satisfied  with  his  own 
productions  and  generally  feeling  that  he  might  have 
done  better,  he  took  some  pride  in  his  speeches  at  this 
Convention,  as  they  were  delivered  on  the  spur  of  the 
moment,  with  no  previous  preparation.  Finding  them 
very  inadequately  reported,  he  intended  to  write  them 
out  for  future  publication,  but  an  accumulation  of  busi- 
ness resulting  from  his  absence  abroad  caused  him  to 
postpone  doing  so  until  too  late,  to  his  subsequent  regret. 
Just  before  the  State  election  he  made  a  campaign 
speech  in  Faneuil  Hall  in  which  he  took  occasion  to  refer 
as  follows  to  what  had  happened  the  year  before :  — 

I  am  glad  to  find  myself  once  more  standing  face  to  face 
with  so  large  a  body  of  my  constituents.     At  our  last  annual 

^  His  near  connection,  John  Chipman  Gray,  a  former  Vice-President 
of  this  Society,  actively  supported  him. 

5 


66  A  MEMOIR   OF 

election  I  was  myself  a  candidate  for  your  suffrages,  and 
agreeably  to  the  old  custom  (whether  more  honored  in  the 
breach  or  in  the  observance,  I  leave  you  to  judge)  I  took  no 
part  in  the  canvass.  I  cannot  but  remember  that  on  that 
occasion  I  was  something  more  than  a  candidate.  I  was  on 
trial,  —  a  prisoner  at  the  bar,  I  had  almost  said ;  arraigned 
before  the  country,  if  for  no  very  high  crimes,  at  least  for 
what  were  stigmatized  in  some  quarters  as  very  grave  mis- 
demeanors, —  a  toast  on  the  4th  of  July,  and  a  vote  on  the 
11th  of  May.  These  were  the  indictments,  and  political 
death  was  the  penalty,  and  this  is  the  first  opportunity  I  have 
had  of  making  my  acknowledgments,  my  profound  and  hearty 
acknowledgments,  for  the  signal  verdict  you  rendered  in  my 
favor.  I  would  not  prolong  or  revive  the  memory  of  that 
controversy,  or  of  any  other  controversy  which  may  have 
occurred  earlier  or  later  between  those  professing  to  be  real 
Whigs.  I,  sir,  have  treasured  up  no  malice,  no  hatred,  and  no 
uncharitableness  against  those  who  differed  from  me.  Heaven 
forbid  that  the  time  should  come  in  New  England,  or  within 
a  thousand  miles  of  New  England,  when  the  conduct  of  can- 
didates may  not  be  fearlessly  canvassed  and  their  misconduct 
boldly  condemned.  But  meeting  my  constituents  for  the  first 
time  since  then,  and  standing  upon  the  very  threshold  of  the 
duty  to  which  they  have  again  called  me,  I  cannot  avoid  mak- 
ing this  passing  allusion  to  their  constant  kindness.  I  may 
add,  however,  that  I  am  unable  to  indulge  in  any  ecstatic  emo- 
tion of  delight  at  having  been,  for  the  fourth  time,  returned 
to  Congress ;  for  while  I  shall  always  feel  it  to  be  an  honor  to 
represent  the  city  of  Boston,  yet  I  see  nothing  to  cause  me  to 
anticipate  peculiar  pleasure  in  taking  part  in  the  national  leg- 
islature in  the  present  state  of  parties  and  of  the  country.  I 
see  only  discouragement,  difficulty,  and  embarrassment  ahead. 

The  Thirtieth  Congress  came  into  being  on  the  4th  of 
March,  1847,  but  did  not  assemble  until  December.  The 
Whigs  had  in  it  a  small  majority  more  apparent  than 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  67 

real,  as  three  Northern  members  (Joshua  R.  Giddings 
of  Ohio,  Amos  Tuck  of  New  Hampshire,  and  John  G. 
Palfrey  of  Massachusets),  though  still  counted  as  Whigs, 
were  not  likely  to  vote  for  any  candidate  whose  views 
on  the  slavery  question  did  not  satisfy  them,  while  it 
was  apprehended  that  several  Southern  Whig  members 
whose  districts  were  close  might  not  be  willing  to  vote 
for  a  supporter  of  the  Wilmot  Proviso,  for  fear  of  losing 
their  seats.  The  Whig  candidate  for  speaker  in  the 
preceding  Congress  had  been  Samuel  F.  Vinton  of 
Ohio,  —  a  man  so  generally  esteemed  by  his  associates 
that  his  renomination  was  almost  a  matter  of  course, 
unless  his  age  and  health  should  compel  him  to  decline. 
In  this  latter  event  the  person  most  prominently  men- 
tioned for  the  succession  was  Mr.  Winthrop,  and  after 
him  Caleb  B.  Smith  of  Indiana,  afterward  Secretary  of 
the  Interior  in  the  first  Cabinet  of  President  Lincoln. 
Mr.  Winthrop  and  Mr.  Vinton  had  long  been  intimate. 
After  the  death  of  Mr.  Saltonstall,  Mr.  Vinton  was  the 
member  of  the  House  whom  Mr.  Winthrop  most  fre- 
quently consulted  upon  public  affairs  and  Mr.  Vinton 
had  voted  for  him  for  Speaker  in  1845.  They  both 
reached  Washington  by  the  1st  of  December,  and  on 
the  4th  Mr.  Winthrop  wrote  a  friend  as  follows:  — 

You  may  hear  stories  about  my  having  said  this,  that,  or 
the  other,  but  the  truth  is  I  have  said  nothing  and  done 
nothing,  having  only  called  on  those  who  have  called  upon 
me,  and  spoken  to  those  who  have  spoken  to  me.  To  Vinton, 
however,  I  have  talked  freely.  He  will  feel  complimented  by 
a  nomination,  but  has  no  idea  of  running,  being  good  enough 
to  say  I  ought  unquestionably  to  be  Speaker.  Whether  I 
shall  be,  is  very  doubtful.     Our  majority  is  narrow,  and  while 


68  A   MEMOIR   OF 

I  am  not  enough  of  an  antislavery  man  for  some  of  oui 
Northern  friends,  I  am  too  much  of  a  Wilmot  Proviso  man 
for  some  of  our  Southern  ones.  Indeed,  Democratic  newspa- 
pers are  now  holding  me  up  as  '  little  better  than  an  aboli- 
tionist,' an  epithet  which  ought  to  mollify  Giddings,  who,  I 
am  told,  boasts  that  he  can  and  will  defeat  me.  The  bitter- 
ness attributed  to  him  where  I  am  concerned  is  hardly  to  be 
accounted  for  by  our  political  differences  in  recent  years, 
and  I  imagine  I  must  have  trodden  on  his  toes  without 
knowing  it. 

Mr.  Winthrop  then  kept  a  hurried,  irregular  diary, 
the  following  brief  entry  in  which  relates  to  his 
nomination :  — 

Saturday,  Dec.  4.  In  the  evening  to  the  caucus.  Vinton 
nominated  on  first  ballot.  He  declined  with  a  very  handsome 
allusion  to  me.  On  the  second  ballot  I  had  57  votes  to  25  for 
Smith.     Accepted  in  a  few  simple  words. 

The  next  day  the  following  correspondence  passed 
between  Mr.  Winthrop  and  one  of  his  Massachusetts 
colleagues :  — 

53  Coleman's,  Washington, 
Dec.  5,  1847. 

Dear  Sir,  —  It  would  give  me  pleasure  to  aid  by  my  vote 
in  placing  you  in  the  Chair  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 
But  I  have  no  personal  hopes  or  fears  to  dictate  my  course  in 
the  matter,  and  the  great  consideration  for  me  must  be  that 
of  the  policy  which  the  Speaker  will  impress  on  the  action  of 
the  House.  Not  to  trouble  you  with  suggestions  as  to  sub- 
ordinate points,  there  are  some  leading  questions  on  which 
it  may  be  presumed  that  you  have  a  settled  purpose.  May  I 
respectfully  inquire  whether,  if  elected  Speaker,  it  is  your 
intention : 

So  to  constitute  the  Committees  of  Foreign  Relations  and 
of  Ways  and  Means  as  to  arrest  the  existing  war ; 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  69 

So  to  constitute  the  Committee  on  Territories  as  to  obstruct 
the  legal  establishment  of  Slavery  within  any  Territory ; 

So  to  constitute  the  Committee  on  the  Judiciary  as  to  favor 
the  repeal  of  the  law  of  Feb.  12,  1793,  which  denies  trial  by 
jury  to  persons  charged  with  being  slaves  ;  to  give  a  fair  and 
favorable  consideration  to  the  question  of  the  repeal  of  those 
Acts  of  Congress  which  now  sustain  Slavery  in  this  District ; 
and  to  further  such  measures  as  may  be  in  the  power  of 
Congress  to  remedy  the  grievances  of  which  Massachusetts 
complains  at  the  hands  of  South  Carolina,  in  respect  to 
ill   treatment   of  her  citizens. 

I  should  feel  much  obliged  to  you  for  a  reply  at  your  early 
convenience,  and  I  should  be  happy  to  be  permitted  to  com- 
municate it,  or  its  substance,  to  some  gentlemen  who  enter- 
tain similar  views  to  mine  on  this  class  of  questions.  I  am, 
dear  sir,  with  great  personal  esteem, 

Your  friend  and  servant, 

John  G.  Palfeey. 


Washington,  Coleman's  Hotel, 
Dec.  5,  1847. 

Dear  Sie,  —  Your  letter  of  to-day  has  this  moment  been 
handed  to  me.  I  am  greatly  obliged  by  the  disposition  you 
express  'to  aid  in  placing  me  in  the  Chair  of  the  House  of 
Representatives.'  But  I  must  be  perfectly  candid  in  saying 
to  you  that,  if  I  am  to  occupy  that  chair,  I  must  go  into  it 
without  pledges  of  any  sort.  I  have  not  sought  the  place.  I 
have  solicited  no  man's  vote.  At  a  meeting  of  the  Whig 
members  of  the  House  last  evening  (at  which,  however,  1 
believe  that  you  were  not  present)  I  was  formally  nominated 
as  the  Whig  candidate  for  Speaker,  and  I  have  accepted  that 
nomination.  But  I  have  uniformly  said  to  all  who  have 
inquired  of  me  that  my  policy  in  organizing  the  House  must 
be  sought  for  in  my  general  conduct  and  character  as  a 
public  man. 


70  A  MEMOIR  OF 

I  have  been  for  seven  years  a  member  of  Congress  from  our 
common  State  of  Massachusetts.  My  votes  are  on  record. 
My  speeches  are  in  print.  If  they  have  not  been  such  as  to 
inspire  confidence  in  my  course,  nothing  that  I  could  get  up 
for  the  occasion,  in  the  shape  of  pledges  or  declaration  of 
purpose,  ought  to  do  so.  Still  less  could  I  feel  it  consistent 
with  my  own  honor,  after  having  received  and  accepted  a 
general  nomination,  and  just  on  the  eve  of  the  election,  to 
frame  answers  to  specific  questions  like  those  which  you  have 
proposed,  to  be  shown  to  a  few  gentlemen,  as  you  suggest, 
and  to  be  witliheld  from  the  great  body  of  the  Whigs.  Deeply, 
therefore,  as  I  should  regret  to  lose  the  distinction  which  the 
Whigs  in  Congress  have  offered  to  me,  and  through  me  to 
New  England,  for  want  of  the  aid  of  a  Massachusetts  vote,  I 
must  yet  respectfully  decline  any  more  direct  reply  to  the 
interrogatories  which  your  letter  contains.  I  remain,  with 
every  sentiment  of  personal  esteem. 

Your  friend  and  servant, 

Robert  C.  Wintheop. 

The  election  took  place  on  Monday,  December  6,  the 
first  vote  being  as  follows  :  — 

Whole  number  of  votes  cast 220 

Necessary  for  a  choice Ill 

Robert  C.  Winthrop,  of  Massachusetts  (Whig)  108 
Linn  Boyd,  of  Kentucky  (Democrat)  ...  61 
Robert  McClelland,  of  Michigan  (Democrat)  .  23 
John  A.  McClernand,  of  Illinois  (Democrat)  .  11 
Scattering  (including  the  votes  of  the  four  can- 
didates just  mentioned) 17 

An  analysis  of  this  vote  shows  that  six  members, 
then  classed  as  Whigs,  did  not  vote  for  Mr.  Winthrop, 
three  from  each  section  of  the  Union,  the  Northern  ones 
being  Giddings,  Tuck,  and  Palfrey,  the  Southern  ones 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  71 

William  M.  Cocke  of  Tennessee,  John  W.  Jones  of 
Georgia,  and  Patrick  W.  Tompkins  of  Mississippi. 
On  the  second  vote,  Jones  of  Georgia  wheeled  into 
line,  and  Tompkins  of  Mississippi,  though  he  could 
not  bring  his  mind  to  support  the  candidate  of  his  party, 
consented  not  to  vote  at  all.^  The  result  was  that  Mr. 
Winthrop,  who  on  the  first  vote  was  three  votes 
short,  now  needed  but  one.  John  Quincy  Adams  then 
sent  George  Ashmun  to  Palfrey  to  ask  him  to  abandon 
further  opposition.  "  If,"  said  the  venerable  ex-Presi- 
dent, "  I  can  vote  for  Mr.  Winthrop  with  a  clear  con- 
science, I  should  suppose  Dr.  Palfrey  could."  Ashmun 
reported  that  Palfrey  was  rather  non-committal,  but 
expressed  some  hope  that,  in  the  end,  Amos  Tuck 
would  not  suffer  the  Speakership  to  go  to  a  Democrat. 
Whether  this  conjecture  was  well  founded  is  immaterial, 
as,  a  few  moments  later,  the  election  was  decided  by 
an  unexpected  circumstance.  The  clerk  had  begun  to 
call  the  roll  for  the  third  time,  when  a  Democratic 
member,  Isaac  E.  Holmes  of  South  Carolina,  arose,  and, 
draping  himself  in  one  of  the  long  cloaks  then  in 
fashion,  marched  solemnly  out  of  the  hall,  disregarding 
the  whispered  remonstrances  of  several  of  his  neighbors. 
One  less  vote  was  therefore  required  to  constitute  an 
election,  and  Mr.  Winthrop  was  declared  Speaker. 
Holmes  had  long  been  one  of  his  particular  friends, 
and  was  fond  of  describing  himself  as  an  "  Independent 
Jeffersonian,"  upon  whom  party  ties  were  not  always 
binding.  He  was  probably  influenced  quite  as  much 
by  dislike  of  Mr.  Giddings  as  by  regard  for  Mr.  Win- 
throp ;  and  in  a  published  letter  to  his  constituents  he 
^  Cocke  of  Tennessee  made  no  sign,  and  was  perhaps  paired. 


72  A  MEMOIR  OF 

vindicated  his  action  substantially  on  the  ground  that 
he  had  defeated  the  machinations  of  Abolitionists  to 
control  the  organization  of  the  House.  Another  South- 
ern friend  of  Mr.  Winthrop,  Carrington  Cabell  of  Florida, 
a  Whig,  was  bitterly  attacked  by  Democratic  newspapers 
in  his  district  for  voting  for  "the  Abolitionist  Winthrop ;  " 
but,  fortunately  for  himself,  he  was  able  to  show  that 
the  Democratic  Speaker  of  the  previous  Congress  (John 
W.  Davis  of  Indiana)  had  given  similar  votes,  upon 
the  Wilmot  Proviso  and  the  Right  of  Petition,  to  those 
for  which  a  Whig  Speaker  was  now  denounced.  I  am 
particular  to  mention  the  precise  circumstances  of  this 
nomination  and  election  because  they  are  described  with 
more  or  less  inaccuracy  in  various  works  of  reference. 
Not  to  refer  to  writers  of  less  note,  two  very  distin- 
guished ones  give  quite  contradictory  accounts  of  what 
occurred :  Henry  Wilson  stating,  on  the  authority  of 
Isaac  E.  Holmes,  a  Democrat,  that  "  the  Southern 
Whigs  opposed  to  the  Wilmot  Proviso  nominated  Mr. 
Winthrop  in  caucus  in  opposition  to  a  majority  of  the 
Northern  Whigs,  who  were  in  favor  of  the  Wilmot  Pro- 
viso and  who  opposed  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Win- 
throp;"^ while  James  G.  Blaine,  on  the  other  hand, 
says,  "  Robert  C.  Winthrop  was  nominated  in  the  Whig 
Caucus  over  Samuel  F.  Vinton  of  Ohio  because  he  had 
voted  for  the  Wilmot  Proviso  and  Mr.  Vinton  against  it. 
Mr.  Vinton  was  senior  in  age  and  long  senior  in  service 
to  Mr.  Winthrop,  and  the  decision  against  him  created 
no  little  feeling  in  Whig  circles,  especially  in  the  West."  ^ 

^  The  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power  in  America.  By  Henry- 
Wilson,  vol.  ii.  p.  27. 

*  Twenty  Years  of  Congress,  1861-1881.  By  James  G.  Blaine,  vol. 
i.  p.  72. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  73 

Mr.  Winthrop  had  always  supposed  that,  of  the  fifty- 
seven  votes  received  by  him  in  the  caucus,  at  least  as 
many  came  from  the  North  as  from  the  South,  though, 
except  in  a  few  cases,  he  was  not  sure  who  voted  for 
him ;  and  he  was  much  taken  aback  that  he  should  be 
accused,  some  seven  and  thirty  years  after  the  event, 
of  having  supplanted  his  friend  Vinton.  Through  a 
mutual  friend  he  pointed  out  to  Mr.  Blaine  that  he  had 
only  received  the  nomination  after  Vinton  had  been 
nominated  and  declined,  that  he  had  owed  the  nomi- 
nation more  to  Vinton  than  to  any  one  man,  and  that 
an  examination  of  the  "  Congressional  Globe  "  would 
show  that  Vinton  had  again  and  again  voted  for  the 
Wilmot  Proviso.  Mr.  Blaine  expressed  polite  regret  for 
his  mistake,  which  he  ascribed  to  an  incorrect  account  of 
the  caucus  which  he  had  met  with  in  a  newspaper  of 
that  period.^ 

Mr.  Winthrop  had  a  pronounced  taste  for  Scriptural 
quotations,  and  his  short  address  on  taking  the  chair 
as  Speaker  contained  the  following  passage :  — 

In  a  time  of  war,  in  a  time  of  high  political  excitement,  in  a 
time  of  momentous  national  controversy,  I  see  before  me  the 
representatives  of  the  people  almost  equally  divided,  not 
merely  as  the  votes  of  this  morning  have  already  indicated, 
in  their  preference  for  persons,  but  in  opinion  and  in  prin- 
ciples, on  many  of  the  most  important  questions  on  which 
they  have  assembled  to  deliberate.  May  I  not  reasonably 
claim,  in  advance  from  you  all,  something  more  than  an 

^  In  the  sixth  volume  of  the  second  series  of  this  Society's  Proceedings, 
pp.  72-76,  will  be  found  some  reminiscences  by  Mr.  Winthrop  of  men 
with  whom  he  had  been  intimate  in  Congress,  more  particularly  of 
Samuel  F.  Vinton,  together  with  an  allusion  to  Mr.  Blaine's  statements 
upon  this  and  other  subjects. 


74  A  MEMOIR  OF 

ordinary  measure  of  forbearance  and  indulgence,  for  whatever 
inability  I  may  manifest  in  meeting  the  exigencies  and  em- 
barrassments which  I  cannot  hope  to  escape  ?  And  may  I  not 
reasonably  implore,  with  something  more  than  common  fer- 
vency, upon  your  labors  and  upon  my  own,  the  blessing  of 
that  Almighty  Power  whose  recorded  attribute  it  is  that 
'  He  maketh  men  to  be  of  one  mind  in  a  house '  ?  ^ 

A  week  later  he  wrote  a  friend :  — 

Nobody  can  exaggerate  the  labor  and  anxiety  to  which  I 
have  been  subjected.  If  I  had  been  invested  with  the  entire 
patronage  of  the  Presidency,  I  could  not  have  been  teased  and 
solicited  more  incessantly.  Boys  who  want  to  be  pages, 
women  who  want  to  sell  apples,  men  who  want  to  be  clerks, 
have  surrounded  me  at  every  turn.  Orphans  and  widows 
have  clustered  around  me  like  bees,  and  where  they  could  ex- 
tract no  honey,  have  left  a  sting.  But  the  assignment  of 
committees  has  been  the  hardest  work  I  ever  did  in  my  life. 
In  order  to  get  through  with  it  in  season,  I  more  than  once 
locked  myself  into  my  study  with  a  confidential  clerk  from 
noon  till  midnight,  and  now  that  I  have  fairly  thrown  off  the 
mountain,  I  have  the  discomfort  of  knowing  that  I  have  dis- 
satisfied not  a  few  of  my  friends  and  probably  all  my  enemies. 
Indeed,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  fully  satisfying  one's  self  in 
the  solution  of  such  a  problem.  Aside  from  the  difficulty  of 
reconciling  geographical  claims,  there  have  been  personal 
embarrassments.  One  of  them  was  what  to  do  with  J.  Q. 
Adams.  Of  late  years  he  has  declined  to  serve  on  commit- 
tees ;  but  this  year,  perhaps  because  his  own  party  is  again  in 
power,  he  has  signified  no  such  purpose.  The  only  place 
adequate  to  his  dignity  and  experience  was  the  Chairmanship 
of  Foreign  Affairs,  but  his  views  are  so  peculiar  that,  in  the 

^  An  amusing  discussion  took  place  with  reference  to  this  quotation. 
Some  newspaper  writers,  unable  to  find  it  in  the  Bible,  imagined  that 
they  had  caught  Mr.  Winthrop  tripping.  It  is  from  the  68th  psalm 
in  the  Psalter  of  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  75 

existing  condition  of  the  country,  I  was  afraid  to  risk  it. 
Then  came  the  question  what  to  do  with  our  excellent  crony, 
Joseph  R.  IngersoU.  He  has  been  first  of  the  Whig  minority 
of  Ways  and  Means,  but  his  views  as  to  the  duty  of  sustain- 
ing the  war  are  so  unqualified  that,  if  I  had  made  him  Chair- 
man, I  should  have  seemed  to  favor  further  invasion  of 
Mexico.  I  have  given  this  post  to  Vinton,  and  I  think 
wisely,  but  Toombs,  as  you  may  imagine,  is  a  little  dis- 
gruntled at  the  preference.  Then  that  good  fellow,  Hugh 
White,  wished  to  be  on  the  Ways  and  Means,  but  I  could  not 
leave  the  city  of  New  York  unrepresented  on  a  committee 
which  deals  with  such  great  financial  and  commercial  in- 
terests. Then  our  friend  Jacob  CoUamer  wished  to  be  Chair- 
man of  the  Judiciary,  but  this  interfered  with  my  disposition 
of  IngersoU.  The  whole  business  has  been  as  intricate  as  a 
Chinese  puzzle,  and  it  would  require  many  sheets  of  foolscap 
to  give  you  half  my  reasons.  I  am  truly  sorry  the  North 
Carolina  Whigs  feel  slighted,  but  I  fully  supposed  Shepperd 
would  be  best  pleased  by  having  little  or  nothing  to  do.  The 
only  man  who  has  a  right  to  feel  placed  below  his  desert  is 
Grinnell,  who  most  kindly  and  generously  declined  being 
considered  for  a  Chairmanship.  I  should  have  been  glad  to 
have  heaped  coals  of  fire  on  Palfrey  by  assigning  him  to 
something  better,  but  I  could  not  accomplish  this  without 
seeming  to  give  undue  preference  to  Massachusetts. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  describe  in  detail  the  composition 
of  these  committees.  It  is  enough  to  say  that  while 
Mr.  Giddings  broadly  charged  that  they  "  were  all  ar- 
ranged in  such  a  manner  as  to  effect  the  political  objects 
which  he  [Mr.  Winthrop]  had  in  view,"  Mr.  Toombs, 
on  the  other  hand  (after  his  quarrel  with  Mr.  Winthrop 
in  1849),  maintained  that  they  were  characterized  by 
gross  unfairness  to  the  South.  A  particularly  sharp 
controversy  arose  over  the  Committee  on  the  District  of 


76  A   MEMOIR  OF 

Columbia,  Mr.  Toombs  complaining  tbat  it  consisted  of 
five  Northern  members  to  four  Southern  ones,  and  Mr. 
Giddings  attacking  it  as  a  committee  in  the  interest  of 
the  South,  one  of  the  Northern  members,  as  he  asserted, 
being  practically  a  slaveholder.  The  allusion  was  to  a 
colleague  of  his  own  from  Ohio,  Thomas  0.  Edwards, 
who  forthwith  proceeded  to  denounce  Mr.  Giddings  in 
print  as  a  deliberately  imtruthful  person,  and  claimed 
that  his  (Edwards's)  relation  to  slavery  had  been  similar 
to  that  of  James  G.  Birney  and  John  G.  Palfrey,  both 
of  whom  had  inherited  slaves  and  manumitted  them. 
The  whole  matter  is  summed  up,  with  a  degree  of  fair- 
ness unusual  in  a  political  opponent,  by  our  associate 
Pierce,  who  says :  — 

The  explanation  of  Palfrey's  opposition  to  Winthrop  at 
Washington,  and  Sumner's  and  Adams's  in  Massachusetts, 
is  that  they  regarded  him  then,  as  they  regarded  Webster 
later,  as  the  great  obstruction  to  the  antislavery  movement 
in  the  State.  Winthrop,  aside  from  what  may  be  said  on 
the  slavery  question,  made  one  of  the  best  speakers  who  ever 
filled  that  eminent  chair;  and  even  the  antislavery  men 
were  not  entirely  agreed  that  he  did  injustice  in  his  appoint- 
ments of  committees  by  which  questions  concerning  slavery 
were  to  be  considered.  Horace  Mann  thought  him  fair  in 
this  respect.  ...  At  this  distance  from  the  controversy  which 
left  many  stings  behind,  and  after  trying  to  judge  it  fairly, 
this  may  be  considered  a  just  conclusion :  Winthrop  was 
placed  in  the  chair  by  his  party  as  a  whole,  by  the  votes  of 
Southern  as  well  as  Northern  members,  and  could  not  be 
expected  to  discriminate  between  them;  but  all  that  could 
be  expected  was  that  he  should  hold  the  balance  fairly  be- 
tween the  conflicting  forces  within  his  party.  He  was  not, 
and  did  not  pretend  to  be,  a  Free-Soiler,  —  not  even  a  Whig 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  77 

who  had  made  opposition  to  slavery  paramount;  and  while 
it  was  right  for  Palfrey  to  question  him,  it  was  equally  his 
right,  even  his  duty,  to  make  no  private  pledges  as  to  his 
action  as  Speaker.^ 

The  dissatisfaction  of  extremists  with  some  of  his 
committees  was  not  the  only  fault  found  with  Mr.  Win- 
throp  at  the  outset  of  his  Speakership.  It  was  for  a 
moment  cast  into  the  shade  by  a  local  grievance.  The 
Capitol  was  then  under  the  joint  authority  of  the  Vice- 
President  and  the  Speaker,  each  controlling  their  respec- 
tive halves  of  the  building,  in  the  basement  of  which 
had  gradually  been  established  two  eating  and  drinking 
saloons,  frequented  alike  by  Congressmen  and  by  the 
public,  and  not  infrequently  the  scene  of  disgusting  in- 
ebriety. Mr.  Winthrop  was  by  no  means  a  rigid  Puri- 
tan. He  habitually  drank  wine  at  dinner.  He  was  no 
stranger  to  the  occasional  use  of  whiskey  for  the 
stomach's  sake,  and  he  thoroughly  enjoyed  tobacco  in 
the  form  of  cigars  until  he  was  eighty-five  years  old. 
But  he  detested  the  convivial  habit  of  gathering  around 
a  public  counter  to  partake  of  spirits  between  meals, 
believing  it  to  be  the  most  prolific  cause  of  intemper- 
ance. One  of  his  first  official  acts  was  to  close  the  bar 
under  the  House  wing,  —  a  course  freely  commended  by 
judicious  persons,  but  which  gave  rise  to  much  private 
grumbling,  including  not  a  few  letters  of  remonstrance 
from  members  of  both  parties. 

In  a  recent  work  of  Miss  Follett,  published  under  the 
auspices  of  our  associate.  Professor  Hart,^  are  to  be  found 

1  Memoir  and  Letters  of  Charles  Sumner,  vol.  iii.  pp.  151,  152. 

2  The  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives.  By  M.  P.  Follett. 
New  York,  1896. 


78  A  MEMOIR   OF 

various  anecdotes  connected  with  Mr.  Winthrop's 
Speakership,  which  were  told  by  him  to  the  author  in 
old  age  and  are  more  fully  recorded  in  his  note-books.  I 
will  not  take  up  space  by  repeating  them,  though  it 
may  be  well  to  refer  in  passing  to  one  relating  to 
precedence,  then,  as  ever  before  and  since,  a  burning  ques- 
tion in  Washington  society.  Mr.  Winthrop  was  per- 
sonally of  opinion  that  a  strict  adherence  to  hierarchical 
order  was  all  very  well  for  State  ceremonials,  but  that  a 
considerable  degree  of  latitude  in  such  matters  was  apt 
to  contribute  greatly  to  the  pleasure  of  informal  social 
intercourse.  John  Quincy  Adams  and  Thomas  H.  Ben- 
ton, however,  took  him  to  task  for  his  laxity,  main- 
taining that,  as  third  officer  of  the  Nation,  he  should 
never  yield  the  'pas  to,  or  call  first  upon,  any  one  but  the 
President  and  Vice-President.  Mr.  Winthrop  suggested 
that  as  the  Secretary  of  State  (Buchanan)  was  nearly 
twenty  years  his  senior,  and  Chief  Justice  Taney  well- 
nigh  old  enough  to  be  his  grandfather,  an  exception 
might  now  and  then  be  made  in  their  favor.  ^'  On  no 
account,"  almost  shrieked  Mr.  Adams,  who  was  in  one 
of  his  excited  moods ;  '^  Cabinet  officers  and  Judges 
of  the  Supreme  Court  are  the  mere  creatures  of  the 
Executive.  We  are  the  Representatives  of  the  People, 
and  you,  for  the  time  being,  our  official  head.  It  will 
not  become  you  to  forget  it." 

Under  date  of  Jan.  17,  1848,  he  wrote  in  his  diary : 

I  am  at  a  loss  to  know  what  course  to  take  to  repel  a 
specific  charge  of  Mr.  Giddings  which  I  found,  only  the  other 
day,  in  a  Ohio  newspaper  which  was  sent  me  anonymously, 
but  which,  I  am  told,  has  been  repeatedly  copied  into  other 
papers.     In  the  course  of  a  letter  of  several  columns  he  de- 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  79 

liberately  asserts  that  *  on  the  morning  on  which  war  was 
declared,  at  a  meeting  of  the  Whig  members  of  Congress, 
Mr.  Winthrop  seized  upon  the  first  opportunity  to  speak  in 
favor  of  voting  for  the  war,  and  advised  the  whole  party  to 
sustain  the  bill  declaring  war,  which  it  was  expected  would 
be  presented  at  the  session  of  that  day.'  Now  I  never  heard 
of  such  a  meeting  before,  never  attended  such  a  meeting,  nor 
made  any  such  speech.  I  am  willing  to  believe  Giddings 
intends  to  speak  the  truth,  but  his  intense  prejudices  have 
led  him  into  some  strange  hallucination  or  confusion  of 
memory  after  the  lapse  of  a  year  and  a  half.  At  my  request 
a  few  of  my  colleagues  came  this  evening  to  consult  with 
me  on  this  subject.  There  were  present  Joseph  Grinnell, 
Charles  Hudson,  Daniel  P.  King,  Artemas  Hale,  and  Amos 
Abbott.  They  all  bear  me  out  in  contradicting  this  and 
other  assertions  of  Giddings,  but  it  is  thought  hardly  con- 
sistent with  my  dignity  as  Speaker  to  take  any  notice  of 
them  at  present.  An  opportunity  may  arise  hereafter,  and 
in  the  mean  time  evidence  can  be  taken.^ 

On  the  21st  of  January,  1848,  he  wrote  his  friend 
Kennedy,  who  was  engaged  on  a  biographical  notice  of 
him  for  the  "  Whig  Review  "  :  — 

One  word  as  to  this  thirty-day  Immortality  I  am  to  receive 
under  your  auspices.  The  Sumner-Giddings  fraternity  are 
trying  hard  to  convince  my  Northern  and  Western  friends 
that  I  am  false  to  Northern  principles,  a  truckler  to  Southern 
dictation,  and  a  principal   and   constant  supporter   of  this 

1  Mr.  Giddings  subsequently  quoted  E.  D.  Culver  of  New  York,  a 
former  member  of  the  House,  who  said  he  was  present  at  a  caucus  on 
the  morning  of  May  11,  1846,  and  that  he  "  thought "  Robert  C.  Win- 
throp, Washington  Hunt,  and  Samuel  F.  Vinton  made  speeches  at  it. 
In  reply,  Hunt  and  Vinton  denied  having  been  present.  Hunt  adding 
that  he  was  then  absent  from  Washington.  John  W.  Houston  of  Dela- 
ware remembered  such  a  caucus,  but  stated  that  it  was  thinly  attended, 
and  that  he  had  a  distinct  recollection  that  Mr.  Winthrop  was  not 
present. 


80  A  MEMOIR  OF 

abominable  war.  Sumner  is  striking  his  Ijre  to  this  tune 
in  the  Boston  Courier  and  Giddings  has  written  verbose 
epistles  to  his  constituents  on  the  same  subject.  Meantime, 
certain  Southern  Whigs  are  defending  their  votes  for  me  by 
letters  containing  here  and  there  unintentional  inaccuracies. 
Holmes,  for  instance,  unaccoimtably  presents  me  as  an  anti- 
Wilmot-Proviso  man,  while  Cabell  (though  his  letter  is  gener- 
ally excellent)  has  set  down  one  or  two  matters  in  a  way 
to  do  a  little  injustice  to  my  views.  The  long  and  short  of 
all  this  is  that,  as  my  votes  are  on  record  and  my  speeches 
in  print,  I  am  anxious  to  be  presented  by  you  in  my  real 
character ;  i.  e.,  as  an  opponent  of  the  war,  as  neither  false  to 
the  North  nor  to  the  South,  but  as  uniting  with  that  sense 
of  the  evils  of  slavery  which  is  common  to  the  Free  States, 
that  respect  for  the  Constitution  and  the  Union  which  would 
infringe  on  no  right  of  the  Slave  States.  Sat  verb  urn.  You 
would  be  greatly  edified  by  some  of  the  newspapers  I  find  in 
my  mail.  '  This  Winthrop,'  says  a  Western  Loco-foco  print, 
'  is  the  fellow  who  sold  himself  to  the  South  last  year,  by 
voting  against  the  Wilmot  Proviso.'  '  The  Wilmot  Proviso,' 
cries  a  Southern  sheet,  '  call  it  not  so,  but  rather  the  Win- 
throp Proviso^  for  Mr.  Winthrop  moved  it  two  years  before 
Mr.  Wilmot  thought  of  it  I ' 


In  spite  of  his  long  experience  as  a  presiding  officer, 
both  as  Speaker  in  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  and 
as  Chairman  of  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  in  Washing- 
ton, his  new  duties  proved  somewhat  more  laborious 
than  he  had  expected,  partly  owing  to  the  complexity 
and  conflict  of  the  Eules  and  Orders  then  existing,  and 
partly  to  the  election  of  a  Clerk  of  the  House  who  saw 
fit  to  remove  the  experienced  assistants  accustomed  to 
look  up  precedents  at  a  moment's  notice,  thereby  oblig- 
ing the  Speaker  to  attend  to  his  own  duties  and  look 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  81 

after  the  clerks  besides.  What  he  liked  best  about  his 
office  was  the  opportunity  it  afforded  him  for  increased 
hospitality.  He  had  hardly  been  elected  before  he  took 
a  house,  engaged  a  French  cook,  and  began  to  give  two 
large  dinners  a  week,  with  smaller  ones  as  occasion 
served.  From  boyhood  he  had  been  accustomed  to  meet 
at  his  father's  table  the  principal  persons  in  New  Eng- 
land, together  with  all  distinguished  strangers  who 
passed  through  Boston,  and  it  was  a  genuine  pleasure 
to  him  —  a  pleasure  which  never  palled  —  to  assemble 
around  his  own  board  not  merely  the  celebrities  of 
Washington  society,  but  his  associates  in  Congress  of 
all  shades  of  opinion.  For  convenience  he  kept  lists 
of  his  guests,  and  the  recurrence  on  them  of  names  like 
Clay,  Webster,  and  Calhoun  was  a  matter  of  course  ; 
but  there  is  a  single  entry  of  a  name  destined  in  process 
of  time  to  outshadow  all  the  rest,  that  of  the  "  lone  star 
of  Illinois  "  as  he  was  sometimes  called,  he  being  then 
the  only  Whig  in  the  delegation  from  that  State.  Mr. 
Winthrop  was  not  one  of  those,  if  any  there  were,  who  dis- 
cerned in  Abraham  Lincoln  at  that  period  the  promise 
of  exceptional  fame ;  but  he  liked  him  personally,  find- 
ing him  shrewd  and  kindly,  with  an  air  of  reserved 
force.  The  greatest  man  then  in  the  House,  as  admitted 
by  those  who  liked  him  least,  was  John  Quincy  Adams, 
with  whom  Mr.  Winthrop' s  intercourse,  in  spite  of  some 
differences  of  opinion,  had  been  frequent  ever  since  he 
entered  Congress.  On  the  19th  of  February,  1848,  he 
recorded  in  his  diary  :  — 

Passed  part  of  the  evening  with  Mr.  Adams.  He  was 
particularly  kind  and  cordial,  full  of  reminiscences  of  his 
early  life. 


82  A  MEMOIR   OF 

Two  days  later,  the  old  man,  like  another  Chatham, 
fell  on  the  floor  of  the  House,  and,  on  the  evening  of  the 
24th,  died  in  the  Speaker's  room  in  the  Capitol.  Mr. 
Winthrop's  official  announcement  of  his  death  was  short, 
but  impressive.     I  quote  a  single  sentence :  — 

Whatever  advanced  age,  long  experience,  great  ability, 
vast  learning,  accumulated  public  honors,  a  spotless  private 
character,  and  a  firm  religious  faith  could  do  to  render  any 
one  an  object  of  interest,  respect,  and  admiration,  they  had 
done  for  this  distinguished  person  ;  and  interest,  respect,  and 
admiration  are  but  feeble  terms  to  express  the  feelings  with 
which  the  members  of  this  House  and  the  people  of  this 
country  have  long  regarded  him. 

In  a  note-book  he  wrote  not  long  after :  — 

There  have  been,  I  confess,  moments  in  my  life  —  perhaps 
not  a  few  —  when  John  Quincy  Adams  has  seemed  to  me  the 
most  credulous,  prejudiced,  and  opinionated  of  mortal  men. 
As  a  rule,  however,  he  either  endeared  himself  to  me  by  his 
attractive  conversation,  or  electrified  me  by  his  energy  and 
eloquence.^ 

The  Presidential  possibilities  of  1848  had  long  been 
an  engrossing  topic  of  conversation.  Mr.  Winthrop 
was  decidedly  of  opinion  that  in  the  existing  condition 
of  public  affairs  the  Democrats  would  win  an  easy  vic- 
tory should  the  Conservative  nominee  prove  to  be  Clay, 
"Webster,  or  Judge  McLean.  The  only  chance  for  the 
Wliigs,  in  his  judgment,  was  to  run  an  untried  man, 
one  whose  name  would  excite  popular  sympathy  outside 
of  politics.  His  personal  preference  was  for  General 
Scott,   with  whom  he  had  grown  intimate  during  his 

^  He  was  of  opinion  that  Massachusetts  had  not  adequately  honored 
the  memory  of  Mr.  Adams,  a  statue  of  whom  should,  he  thought,  have 
been  made  a  pendant  to  that  of  Webster  in  front  of  the  State  House. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  83 

residence  in  Washington,  but  he  realized  that  the  en- 
thusiasm aroused  by  General  Taylor's  Mexican  cam- 
paign rendered  him  a  safer  candidate.  With  the  latter 
his  acquaintance  was  then  slight,  but  he  had  formed  a 
high  opinion  of  his  patriotism  and  unselfishness.  Out 
of  regard  for  Mr.  Webster,  however,  he  refrained  from 
any  public  expression  of  his  views,  and  declined  in  ad- 
vance to  be  elected  a  delegate  to  the  Philadelphia  Con- 
vention. From  time  to  time  he  noticed  that  his  own 
name  figured  as  a  possible  candidate  for  the  Vice-Presi- 
dency on  the  Taylor  ticket,  but  he  considered  this  idle 
newspaper-gossip  until,  in  the  latter  part  of  January, 
John  S.  Pendleton  of  Virginia  came  to  him  to  offer  the 
unanimous  support  of  the  delegation  from  that  State  if 
he  would  consent  to  the  use  of  his  name.  This  proposi- 
tion Mr.  Winthrop  at  once  declined,  on  the  ground  that 
it  would  be  sound  policy  for  the  friends  of  General 
Taylor  not  to  couple  him  with  any  particular  man  at 
the  outset,  but  rather  to  leave  the  Vice-Presidency  open 
until  the  last  moment  for  different  candidates  to  hang 
their  hopes  upon.  In  giving  this  advice,  he  made  a 
single  exception,  expressing  the  opinion  that  if  Webster 
could  then  be  persuaded  to  waive  his  claims  and  take 
the  second  place,  a  Taylor  and  Webster  ticket  would 
afford  the  best  assurance  of  victory.^ 

On  the  12th  of  May,  1848,  Mr.  Winthrop  wrote  in 
his  diary :  — 

Thirty-nine  years  old  to-day !  I  have  rarely  entered  on  a 
new  year  with  less  spirit  or  in  worse  health.     Spring  always 

1  If  this  arrangement  could  have  been  effected,  Webster,  as  it  turned 
out,  would  have  had  nearly  three  years  in  the  White  House.  Mr.  Win- 
throp thought  him  ill  advised  at  this  period,  and  that  in  grasping  at  the 
shadow,  he  missed  the  substance. 


84  A  MEMOIR  OF 

brings  with  it  for  me  a  certain  degree  of  debility  and  depres- 
sion, and  this  Spring  has  brought  twice  its  usual  load.  The 
old  elasticity  and  the  old  ambition  seem  to  have  gone  out  of 
me,  and  this  at  an  age  when  some  men  are  just  entering 
public  life.  My  doctor,  as  usual,  is  trying  tonics,  but  there 
is  a  verse  in  the  Psalms  which  does  me  more  good  than  a 
hundred  nostrums  :  '  Wait  on  the  Lord ;  be  of  good  courage ; 
He  will  strengthen  thy  heart ;  wait,  I  say,  on  the  Lord.' 

The  corner-stone  of  the  National  Monument  to 
Washington  was  laid  in  the  capital,  with  appropriate 
exercises,  on  the  4th  of  July,  1848.^  The  orator  of  the 
day  was  to  have  been  John  Quincy  Adams,  after  whose 
death  Mr.  Winthrop  was  appointed.  His  address  was 
much  admired  at  the  time,  and  is  still  familiar  to  readers 
of  commemorative  literature,  though  he  himself  was  not 
wholly  satisfied  with  it. 

I  was  sensible  [he  wrote]  that  I  was  making  a  strong  im- 
pression, and  my  voice  held  out  wonderfully ;  but  there  is 
a  want  of  breadth  and  body  to  the  oration  which  nobody 
realizes  more  than  the  author.  The  truth  is  that,  what  with 
the  intense  heat  and  my  duties  in  the  Chair,  its  preparation 
has  been  a  case  of  invita  Minerva  from  beginning  to  end. 

Shortly  afterward,  he  addressed  a  private  letter  to 
the  Chairman  of  his  Ward  and  County  Committee,  ex- 
pressing his  earnest  wish  to  retire  from  the  representa- 
tion of  Boston  at  the  expiration  of  his  Speakership 
(March  4,    1849)  and  requesting  that  some  one  else 

^  An  odd  instance  of  the  inaccuracy  of  modern  works  of  reference  is  to 
be  found  in  a  statement  in  more  than  one  of  them  that  the  illness  and 
death  of  President  Taylor  followed  closely  his  attendance  upon  these 
exercises.  In  point  of  fact,  the  President  who  took  part  in  them  was 
James  K.  Polk,  and  General  Taylor  was  not  within  a  thousand  miles  of 
Washington. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  85 

should  be  nominated  in  the  autumn.  The  most  urgent 
appeals  were  made  to  him  to  reconsider  this  decision. 
It  was  represented  to  him  by  Nathan  Appleton,  and 
other  friends  whom  he  had  long  been  in  the  habit  of  con- 
sulting, that  it  was  not  for  the  interest  of  the  party  to 
make  a  change  when  a  general  election  was  pending  and 
when  differences  of  opinion  were  certain  to  arise  as  to 
his  fittest  successor.  With  a  good  deal  of  reluctance, 
he  consented  to  submit  the  matter  to  the  Nominating 
Convention  in  October,  agreeing  to  run  again  if,  as 
proved  to  be  the  case,  this  should  be  their  urgent  and 
unanimous  wish,  —  subject  to  an  understanding  that  he 
should  be  at  liberty  to  resign  later  if  he  saw  fit.^  On  his 
return  home  after  the  adjournment  of  Congress,  he  pre- 
ferred not  to  accept  the  offer  of  a  public  dinner,  and  did 
not  think  it  consistent  with  his  office  to  take  an  active 
part  in  opening  the  campaign,  but  he  expressed  his  views 
with  clearness  and  conciseness  in  a  letter  declining  an 
invitation  to  address  a  meeting  in  New  York :  — 

The  Whigs  of  the  Union  [he  wrote]  can  elect  General 
Taylor  President  of  the  Republic,  if  they  will.  They  can 
elect  nobody  else.  The  only  other  result  they  can  accomplish 
is  the  success  of  General  Cass.  If  any  of  them  see  fit  to  adopt 
the  latter  of  these  two  alternatives,  they  may  denounce  whom 
they  please  as  being  no  true  Whigs ;  they  will  convict  no- 
body but  themselves.  As  the  fairly  selected  nominee  of  the 
National  Convention,  in  which  the  Whig  party,  the  whole 
Whig  party,  and  nothing  but  the  Whig  party,  was  represented, 
General  Taylor  is  in  my  judgment  entitled  to  the  support  of 
all  who  recognize  party  organization.  As  an  avowed  Whig, 
—  none  the  less  likely  to  be  a  true  Whig,  a  firm  Whig,  or  a 

^  For  correspondence  on  this  subject  see  Addresses  and  Speeches  of 
Robert  C.  Winthrop,  vol.  i.  pp.  627-629. 


86  A  MEMOIR   OF 

wise  Whig,  because  he  has  confessed  himself  not  to  be  an 
ultra  Whig,  —  he  has  a  right,  as  I  think,  to  the  support  of  all 
who  have  voluntarily  united  in  a  Convention  which  has  de- 
clared him  its  candidate.  But,  as  an  honest  man  of  spotless 
character,  sterling  integrity,  strong  sense,  indomitable  courage, 
tried  patriotism,  and  just  principles,  he  has  far  higher  claims 
upon  us  all.  I  believe  him  to  be  all  this,  and  more  than  all 
this.  We  have  had  some  touches  of  his  quality  which  cannot 
be  mistaken.  Under  him  I  believe  we  shall  have  a  peaceful, 
virtuous,  patriotic,  and  Constitutional  Administration.  And 
if  any  accident  should  befall  him  (which  Heaven  avert!) 
your  own  Millard  Fillmore  will  carry  out  such  an  administra- 
tion to  its  legitimate  completion.  I  congratulate  you  on  the 
prospect  before  us.  Nothing  throws  a  cloud  or  a  shadow  on 
it  but  our  own  momentary  dissensions,  and  these  will  rapidly 
vanish  into  thin  air. 

The  ^'dissensions"  thus  alluded  to  arose  from  the 
dissatisfaction  manifested  in  different  parts  of  the 
country  by  friends  of  Clay  and  Webster.  The  attitude 
of  those  two  illustrious  statesmen  at  this  juncture  was 
a  grief  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  to  whom  it  seemed  greatly 
lacking  in  magnanimity.  They  each  had  undoubted 
reason  to  be  chagrined  at  the  preference  accorded  to 
a  successful  soldier ;  but  from  Mr.  Winthrop's  point  of 
view,  the  ridding  of  the  country  of  the  incubus  of  a 
Democratic  administration  was  the  real  duty  of  the 
hour,  and  all  individual  ambitions,  however  justifiable 
at  other  times,  should  have  given  way  to  it.  As  he 
had  considered  Webster  ill  advised  in  the  beginning  in 
not  allowing  his  name  to  be  associated  with  that  of 
Taylor,  so  now  the  disparaging  remarks  attributed  to 
the  former  concerning  the  latter  seemed  even  more  in- 
judicious.    If,  instead  of  finally  according  a  tardy  and 


ROBERT  C.    WINTHROP.  87 

lukewarm  support  to  Taylor's  candidacy,  he  had  advo- 
cated it  generously  at  the  outset,  he  would  beyond  a 
doubt  (so  Mr.  Winthrop  thought)  have  been  offered  the 
Secretaryship  of  State  and  with  it  an  unrivalled  oppor- 
tunity of  service  to  his  country,  to  say  nothing  of  an 
escape  from  the  Senate  before  the  debates  on  the  Com- 
promise. As  matters  stood,  a  local  schism  was  threat- 
ened, Mr.  Webster's  immediate  supporters  (mostly  in  and 
about  Boston)  becoming  known  as  "Webster  Whigs," 
while  the  main  body  of  the  party  in  the  State,  headed 
by  Mr.  Lawrence  and  Mr.  Winthrop,  were  often  styled 
"  Massachusetts  Whigs." 

The  Free-Soilers  naturally  availed  themselves  of  this 
breach,  and  endeavored  to  widen  it  by  insinuating  that 
some  of  Mr.  Webster's  friends  had  not  been  loyal  to  him. 
Party  feeling  then  ran  very  high,  and  in  moments  of 
excitement  good  men  said  strange  things,  one  man  of 
note  asserting  on  the  stump  that,  more  than  a  year 
before  the  Philadelphia  Convention,  he  had  heard  Mr. 
Winthrop,  at  his  own  table  in  Washington,  propose  a 
toast  to  General  Taylor  as  the  fittest  candidate  for  the 
Presidency.  Mr.  Winthrop  fortunately  possessed  a  list 
of  his  dinners,  and  on  writing  to  the  other  guests  on 
the  occasion  in  question,  they  all  denied  that  anything 
of  the  sort  had  taken  place  ;  whereupon  the  accuser 
admitted  that  he  might  have  confused  the  dinner  with 
one  given  by  another  person. 

Mr.  Winthrop  made  a  few  speeches  w^hile  the  election 
was  pending ;  one  of  them  in  September,  at  the  Whig 
Convention  in  Worcester,  another  at  Faneuil  Hall  in 
November,  the  night  before  the  general  election,  when 
he  divided  the  applause  with  Mr.  Choate.     They  were 


88  A  MEMOIR  OF 

largely  extempore,  and  finding  them  inadequately  re- 
ported he  undertook  to  write  them  out  for  future  pub- 
lication, which  he  never  accomplished.  Many  years 
afterward  he  learned  for  the  first  time  that  his  Wor- 
cester speech  had  received  high  encomium  from  Abraham 
Lincoln,  who  was  among  his  auditors.^  In  his  remarks 
at  Faneuil  Hall  he  made  no  allusion  to  the  fact  that  he 
was  for  the  fifth  time  a  candidate  for  the  representation 
of  Boston,  but  at  the  ensuing  Congressional  election, 
he  received  a  majority  of  3,930  over  the  combined  vote 
of  his  competitors,  one  of  whom  was  Charles  Sumner. 

I  insert  here  a  few  extracts  from  private  letters  writ- 
ten by  him  after  the  reassembling  of  Congress  :  — 

[Dec.  11,  1848.]  I  have  just  read  a  new  falsehood  about 
myself,  but  it  is  only  new  in  the  species,  not  in  the  genus. 
The  '  Union,'  copying  from  the  '  Philadelphia  Evening  Bul- 
letin,' says  I  am  represented  as  having  made  a  speech,  at  the 
supper  to  Truman  Smith  in  New  York,  proclaiming  what  the 
North  would  do  about  slavery.  Now  I  was  not  present  at  this 
supper,  nor  did  I  attend  any  meeting,  deliberative  or  festive, 
on  my  way  to  Washington,  nor  have  I  ever  expressed  any 
such  sentiments.  I  think  I  shall  stamp  this  lie  publicly,  for 
I  have  so  often  allowed  such  things  to  pass  current  that 
some  people  seem  to  think  they  can  soil  me  with  impunity. 
...  As  to  newspaper  suggestions  of  my  going  into  the 
Cabinet,  or  to  London,  the  former  I  should  not  care  for,  and 
the  latter  will  end  in  smoke,  as  things  in  London  are  apt  to 
do.  The  very  rumor  of  such  a  likelihood  would  defeat  it, 
there  are  so  many  conflicting  claims.     Besides  the  one  you 

^  Mr.  Lincoln's  own  speeches  in  Massachusetts  during  this  canvass 
have  been  strangely  neglected  by  his  biographers,  perhaps  because  the 
language  he  indulged  in  with  reference  to  the  Free-Soil  party,  though 
characteristically  humorous,  was  the  reverse  of  complimentary. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  89 

mention,  I  have  good  reason  for  thinking  that  Everett  would 
not  be  indisposed  to  return  to  England,  and  I  could  not  con- 
sent to  be  brought  into  competition  with  one  who  is  not 
merely  my  personal  friend,  but  my  superior  in  age,  in  ability, 
and  in  accomplishments.  The  chances  are  that  the  Adminis- 
tration will  think  a  single  slice  of  so  rich  a  loaf  as  the  London 
mission  enough  for  any  man.  In  any  case,  however,  I  wish 
my  friends  to  know  that  I  have  never  had  the  smallest  under- 
standing with  Taylor's  immediate  supporters  that  anything 
should  be  offered  me,  though  I  am  aware  Giddings  charges 
that  a  bargain  was  made  long  ago  by  which  old  Zack  was  to 
be  President  and  I  Speaker. 

[Dec.  21.]  You  will  have  noticed  in  different  papers  some 
amusing  bits  of  Cabinet-making,  one,  in  particular,  in  which 
I  figure  as  Postmaster-General  (Heaven  forefend !  )  As  a 
bit  of  mosaic  it  reminded  me  of  the  invited  guests  at 
Webster's  table  on  Tuesday  last.  '  Mr.  Winthrop,'  said  the 
Godlike  ^  on  my  arrival,  '  be  good  enough  to  sit  opposite  me, 
with  General  Dix  and  General  Caleb  Gushing  on  your  right 
and  left.  I  will  take  Mr.  John  Van  Buren  and  Mr.  Prescott 
Hall  on  my  right  and  left,  and  Mr.  Reverdy  Johnson  and  the 
other  guests  can  intersperse  themselves  on  either  side.'  So 
we  sat,  true  Whigs  and  mongrel  Whigs,  Free-Soilers  and  Cass- 
ites,  in  a  room  hardly  big  enough  to  breathe  in,  but  the 
unaccountable  non-appearance  of  Caleb  seriously  impaired 
the  variety  of  the  entertainment.  We  had  a  good  time,  how- 
ever, Webster  making  up  for  the  medley  of  his  company  by 
the  richness  and  fulness  of  his  conversation.  .  .  .  The  solici- 
tations, personal  or  by  letter,  of  a  thousand  seekers  of  minor 
offices  have  begun  to  make  my  life  a  burden  to  me.  The 
state  of  things  is  already  worse  than  after  Harrison's  election, 
and  what  it  will  be  by  the  fourth  of  March  Heaven  only 
knows.     It  is  a  melancholy  exhibition,  and  the  worst  feature 

1  Elderly  readers  may  remember  that  one  of  Daniel  Webster's  most 
popular  nicknames  was  "  the  Godlike  Dan." 


90  A  MEMOIR   OF 

of  our  political  system.  By  the  way,  I  was  last  night  the 
guest  of  honor  at  a  banquet  given  by  citizens  of  Washington 
to  members  of  the  Thirtieth  Congress.  I  will  send  you  my 
remarks  in  print,  though  they  do  not  amount  to  much. 

[Jan.  20,  1849.]  I  have  long  felt  that  the  best  hope  of  rid- 
ding this  country  of  slavery,  if  this  great  consummation  is  ever 
to  be  achieved,  lies  in  clearly  establishing  the  principle  that 
emancipation  by  the  Government  against  the  will  of  slave- 
owners must  be  accomplished  by  just  compensation,  and  that 
the  national  resources  must  defray  the  cost.  The  doctrine 
of  Giddings  strikes  at  this  whole  idea  of  property  to  be  paid 
for,  and  the  entire  South  is  thus  rallied  blindly  against  any- 
thing in  the  nature  of  concession.  If  a  pecuniary  arrange- 
ment could  be  effected  by  which  all  negroes  born  after  1876 
could  be  declared  free,  another  half-century  would  see  the 
evil  removed.  Begin  where  you  will  in  the  solution  of  the 
great  problem  of  Abolition  (I  mean,  of  course,  anywhere  but 
in  insurrection  and  revolution)  and  Compensation  must  go 
hand-in-hand  with  Emancipation.  It  is  this  view  which  takes 
away  the  idea  of  selfishness  from  Northern  philanthropy.  If 
we  agree  to  unite  with  the  South  in  bearing  the  burdens  and 
defraying  the  cost  of  Abolition,  we  make  it  a  matter  of  joint 
interest,  in  regard  to  which  our  voices  may  fairly  be  heard. 
I  fear  the  day  is  distant  when  anything  will  be  done,  and 
meantime  a  spirit  of  Agitation  at  one  end  of  the  Union,  and 
of  Dissolution  at  the  other,  grows  apace. 

[Feb.  11.]  A  week  ago  I  was  confidentially  informed,  and 
am  now  at  liberty  to  mention  privately  to  you,  that  Taylor's 
purpose  was  to  offer  me  the  State  Department  in  case  Clayton 
should  make  up  his  mind  to  decline  it,  he  having  at  the  out- 
set some  idea  of  retaining  his  seat  in  the  Senate.  In  the 
present  state  of  the  country  I  had  rather  have  had  the  com- 
pliment than  the  office,  and  I  am  glad  Clayton  decided  to 
accept,  though  I  should  have  liked  it  better  still  if  Webster 
could  have  had  it,  which  was,  I  suppose,  out  of  the  question. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  91 

Furthermore,  it  has  been  intimated  to  me  that  if  I  had  a  par- 
ticular fancy  for  the  Navy  Department,  it  might  '  perhaps ' 
be  arranged.  I  replied  I  had  no  such  fancy.  Indeed,  with 
my  dislike  of  the  Washington  climate,  it  would  be  full  of 
horror  to  me  to  be  cooped  up  in  a  bureau  signing  all  sorts  of 
papers  connected  with  naval  administration,  —  a  subject  about 
which  I  know  little  and  care  less.  Moreover,  I  greatly  ques- 
tion the  expediency  of  passing  over  Lawrence  unless  he  is 
otherwise  provided  for.  He  has  rendered  important  service 
to  the  party  and  came  very  close  to  the  nomination  for  Vice- 
President.  I  have  said  repeatedly  that  he  would  make  a 
good  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  and  I  do  not  see  the  force  of 
some  objections  which  have  been  raised  to  this. 


Y. 


The  second  winter  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  Speakership 
ended  in  a  political  storm.  The  condition  of  things  had 
been  critical  for  some  time,  and  on  the  last  night  of  the 
session  the  tempest  broke  out.  The  House  had  passed 
territorial  bills  with  an  antislavery  restriction,  but  the 
Senate  first  laid  them  on  the  table  and  then  foisted  into 
the  General  Appropriation  Bill  a  provision  for  territorial 
governments  without  any  such  restriction.  The  House 
non-concurred,  and  a  conference  was  called  for.  Toombs 
and  Stephens  urged  Mr.  Winthrop  to  appoint  to  this 
Committee  men  who  would  favor  a  concurrence  with  the 
Senate,  which  Mr.  Winthrop  positively  declined  to  do, 
and  made  his  appointments  according  to  his  own  con- 
victions of  duty.  The  night  was  spent  in  agitation  and 
confusion,  in  the  course  of  which  the  Speaker  was  con- 
strained to  call  Mr.  Toombs  by  name  and  order  him  to 


92  A  MEMOIR  OF 

his  seat,  —  a  step  taken  with  much  reluctance,  as 
the  offender,  though  occasionally  wrong-headed,  was  a 
man  of  commanding  intellect  and  one  for  whom  Mr. 
Winthrop  had  a  real  regard.  The  clock  had  been  put 
back;  and  when  the  sun  rose  on  the  morning  of  Sun- 
day, March  4,  1849,  he  had  been  in  the  chair  the 
greater  part  of  twenty  hours.  In  describing  what  took 
place,  Horace  Mann  wrote :  — 

"  There  were  two  regular  fist-fights  in  the  House  and  one 
in  the  Senate.  Some  members  were  fiercely  exasperated,  and 
had  the  North  been  as  ferocious  as  the  South,  or  the  Whigs 
as  violent  as  the  Democrats,  it  is  probable  there  would  have 
been  a  general  mel^e.  But  all  this  depends  upon  the  men. 
I  walked  round  the  House  a  number  of  times,  conversed  with 
all  the  Southern  slaveholders  whom  I  knew,  and,  by  introduc- 
tion, with  some  I  had  not  known,  and  had  not  an  uncivil  word. 
At  last,  at  seven  this  morning,  Mr.  Winthrop  made  an  elegant 
farewell  address  in  answer  to  a  vote  of  thanks,  and  we  all 


This  vote  of  thanks  was  moved  by  a  Democrat,  Ex- 
Governor  James  McDowell  of  Virginia,  who  paid  the 
customary  acknowledgment,  at  the  close  of  a  Congress, 
to  the  ''  able,  dignified,  and  impartial "  manner  in  which 
the  Speaker  had  presided  over  their  deliberations.  The 
words  were  hardly  out  of  his  mouth  when  Andrew 
Johnson  of  Tennessee  moved  that  the  word  "impartial" 
be  stricken  out  of  the  resolution,  charging  Mr.  Win- 
throp with  having  been  unfair  to  the  South,  not  merely 
in  the  appointment  of  committees,  but  in  his  habitual 
awards   of    the   floor.      Fourteen   members    supported 

1  Life  of  Mann,  p.  277. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  93 

Johnson  on  division,  but  as  Mr.  Wintlirop  was  not  pres- 
ent and  as  there  was  no  roll-call,  he  did  not  learn  pre- 
cisely who  they  were,  but  was  told  they  were  a  curious 
admixture  of  Democrats,  Free-Soilers,  and  disaffected 
Southern  Whigs.     Shortly  afterward  he  wrote :  — 

Toombs  is  not  likely  to  forgive  what  happened,  particu- 
larly as  he  has  lashed  himself  into  a  sort  of  fury  over  the 
idea  (which  I  think  he  honestly  entertains)  that  Southern 
rights  and  Southern  property  are  in  danger.  It  will  not 
surprise  me  if  he  rallies  enough  followers  of  the  extreme 
type  to  defeat  my  re-election  next  December.  Our  ma- 
jority (if  we  have  one)  will  be  so  narrow  that  a  slight  de- 
fection would  turn  the  balance.  For  myself,  I  care  little.  I 
suppose  I  may  say  without  vanity  that  I  have  made  some 
figure  in  the  chair,  but  I  could  hardly  hope  to  increase  my 
reputation  by  presiding  for  a  second  term  over  such  a  hornet's 
nest  as  the  House  has  now  become.  I  lament,  however,  the 
possibility  of  a  Democratic  Speaker  in  the  present  condition 
of  the  country.  The  funny  part  of  the  matter  is,  that  if 
Toombs  succeeds  in  pushing  me  from  my  stool,  Giddings, 
more  suo,  will  at  once  claim  the  credit  of  it  and  boast  to 
his  constituents  that  it  was  he  who  killed  Cock  Robin. 

On  the  following  day  it  became  Mr.  Winthrop's  offi- 
cial duty  to  escort  to  the  Inauguration  at  the  Capitol 
both  the  incoming  and  retiring  Presidents.  At  the 
former's  desire  he  called  for  him  some  time  in  advance 
in  order  to  explain  a  few  matters  of  ceremonial,  the 
General  having  modestly  mentioned  that  he  had  been 
but  once  inside  the  Senate-chamber,  and  then  only  as  a 
spectator  in  the  gallery.  This  was  the  first  occasion 
when  Mr.  Winthrop  had  seen  him  alone,  and  he  was 
much  impressed  by  his  simplicity  of  character,  combined 


94  A  MEMOIR  OF 

with  evidences  of  earnest,  patriotic,  resolute  purpose. 
He  dwelt  with  frankness  upon  his  want  of  familiarity 
with  the  public  men  of  the  country  and  the  great  dis- 
advantage this  had  been  to  him  in  the  selection  of 
his  advisers.  He  added,  however,  that  he  had  been 
quite  a  reader  of  debates  in  Congress,  and  that  to  his 
appreciation  of  several  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  speeches  was 
due  the  wish  he  had  originally  formed  to  have  him  in 
his  Cabinet.  In  reply,  Mr.  Winthrop  paid  a  compli- 
ment to  Mr.  Clayton,  but  took  occasion  to  express  the 
hope  that  a  way  might  be  found  to  bring  Mr.  Webster 
into  full  accord  with  the  Administration.  Some  days 
later,  William  W.  Seaton,  Mayor  of  Washington,  and 
an  intimate  friend  both  of  the  President  and  himself, 
came  to  him  privately  and  said :  "  The  General  is 
bothered  to  death  by  pressure  for  office,  both  direct  and 
indirect.  He  would  like  to  offer  you  the  mission  to 
London,  but  Clayton  is  of  opinion  that  it  would  be  for 
the  interest  of  the  party  if  you  could  be  persuaded  to 
stay  in  Congress,  and,  in  any  case,  he  prefers  to  keep 
the  foreign  appointments  in  abeyance  for  the  present. 
If,  however,  you  will  suffer  me  to  go  to  the  General  and 
tell  him  from  you  that  the  post  would  be  particularly 
agreeable  to  you,  I  think  this  can  be  arranged  forthwith. 

Otherwise,    it   may  eventually   go   to  or  ^ 

Mr.  Winthrop  positively  refused  to  send  such  a  mes- 
sage, on  the  ground  that  he  had  always  made  it  a  rule 
of  conduct  never  to  ask  for  anything,  and  that  he  was 
very  sensitive  to  imputations  of  self-seeking.  Tempting 
as  was  the  prospect  held  out,  he  had  grave  doubts 
whether  it  was  not  his  duty  to  stay  at  home  and  devote 
personal  attention  to  his  children,  of  whom,  since  their 


EGBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  95 

mother  s  death,  he  had  been  able  to  see  comparatively 
little.  After  thinking  the  whole  matter  over  carefully, 
he  sat  down  and  wrote  a  friendly  note  to  Clayton, 
suggesting  that  it  might  relieve  the  Administration 
from  embarrassment  if  it  were  distinctly  understood 
that  he  was  not  a  candidate  for  any  office  in  its  gift. 
This  done,  he  returned  with  a  clear  conscience  to 
Boston,  where  he  occupied  himself  with  an  accumula- 
tion of  private  business  and  with  the  preparation  of 
several  non-political  addresses  he  had  promised  to  de- 
liver, —  one,  in  particular,  on  the  life  and  public  ser- 
vices of  his  great-grandfather,  Governor  James  Bowdoin, 
for  whose  character  and  career  he  had  a  profound 
admiration  and  many  of  whose  papers  he  had  inherited. 
Later  in  the  summer  he  presided  over  the  Phi  Beta 
Kappa  dinner  at  Cambridge,  and  recruited  his  health 
by  a  tour  of  watering-places,  at  one  of  which  an  event 
occurred  which  changed  the  current  of  his  life,  and  is 
best  described  by  a  passage  in  one  of  his  letters  : 

[Sept.  7,  1849.]  Have  pity  on  me.  I  went  to  Newport 
about  four  weeks  ago  free  and  unshackled.  I  met  there  a 
widow  with  one  little  boy.  I  had  known  her  when  she  was 
a  girl,  and  had  been  intimate  with  her  husband,  so  it  was  not 
unnatural  we  should  sympathize.  Suffice  it  to  say,  I  returned 
ten  days  ago  a  bondman,  and  to-day  it  is  publicly  announced 
that  I  am  going  to  be  married.  The  worst  of  it  is  that  I  am 
unable  to  deny  it.  My  only  consolation  is  that  the  lady  — 
to  one  eye  at  least  in  the  world  — is  a  very  charming  person, 
not  too  young  for  a  man  who  was  made  a  Doctor  of  Laws 
day  before  yesterday,  and  one  of  the  most  thoroughly  amiable 
women  under  the  sun.  I  shall  soon  send  you  an  invitation 
to  a  great  occasion.  Meantime  give  my  best  regards  to  Mrs. 
Kennedy  and  tell  her  I  have  always  taken  her  as  the  pattern 


96  A  MEMOIR  OF 

of  my  matrimonial  needs,  and  that  I  hope  I  have  come  almost 
up  to  the  sample.  Only  tliink  of  my  forgetting  the  name. 
Laura  Welles,  formerly  Laura  Derby,  a  niece  of  that  beautiful 
Mrs.  Richard  Derby  of  the  past,  whose  portrait  you  may 
remember.  One  of  her  sisters  married  Rev.  Ephraim 
Peabody,  and  a  cousin  is  the  second  wife  of  our  friend 
Appleton.  I  preached  at  Bowdoin  College  an  hour  and 
three  quarters  by  the  clock.  A  crowded  audience  sat 
through  it  patiently,  and  some  of  them  were  even  good 
enough  to  say  I  did  well.  You  shall  judge  for  yourself 
when  the  pamphlet  is  out. 

The  marriage  took  place  on  the  15tli  of  October, 
and  put  new  heart  into  Mr.  Winthrop,  who  was  a  man 
of  domestic  tastes,  greatly  dependent  upon  a  cheer- 
ful home.  He  forthwith  took  a  larger  house  in  Wash- 
ington, though  with  little  expectation  of  being  re-elected 
Speaker.  The  contest  for  that  office  lasted  nearly  three 
weeks,  no  less  than  sixty-three  separate  votes  being 
taken,  besides  many  incidental  ones  on  different  sub- 
jects, the  whole  interspersed  with  much  acrimonious 
debate,  —  Andrew  Johnson  taking  the  opportunity  to 
renew  his  attacks  upon  Mr.  Winthrop,  and  declaring 
that  while  only  fifteen  members  had  actually  opposed  the 
vote  of  thanks  of  the  previous  March,  forty-five  others 
had  sat  quietly  in  their  seats  without  voting,  rather 
than  acquit  the  Speaker  of  unfairness  to  the  South. 
It  is  unnecessary  to  describe  all  that  took  place,  but, 
in  view  of  the  inaccurate  or  disingenuous  accounts 
which  have  appeared  in  some  works  of  reference,  it  is 
desirable  to  call  attention  to  a  few  facts.  The  roll  was 
first  called  (Dec.  3,  1849)  with  the  following  result: 
whole  number  of  votes  cast,  221 ;  necessary  to  a  choice, 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  97 

111;  Howell  Cobb  of  Georgia,  Democrat,  103;  Robert 

C.  Winthrop,  of  Massachusetts,  Whig,  96  ;  scattering,  22. 
An  analysis  of  the  scattering  votes  shows  :  Free-Soilers, 
9 ;  Independent  Northern  Democrats  (Peck  of  Vermont, 
Cleveland  of  Connecticut,  Doty  of  Wisconsin),  3  ;  Inde- 
pendent Southern  Democrats  (Holmes  and  Woodward 
of  South  Carolina),  2  ;  Independent  Northern  Whigs 
(Campbell  and  Crowell,  of  Ohio),  2 ;  Disaffected  South- 
ern Whigs  (Toombs,  Stephens,  and  Owen,  of  Georgia, 
Cabell  of  Florida,  Hilliard  of  Alabama,  Morton  of  Vir- 
ginia), 6.  When  the  twenty-first  vote  was  reached, 
Mr.  Cobb's  support  had  greatly  fallen  off,  while  Mr. 
Winthrop's  had  increased  to  102,  his  gradual  gain  of  six 
being  due  to  the  arrival  in  Washington  of  two  belated 
Whigs,  to  the  adhesion  of  one  Free-Soiler  (Howe  of 
Pennsylvania),  and  to  the  wheeling  into  line  of  the  two 
Independent  Northern  Whigs  above  mentioned,  and  a 
single  disaffected  Southern  Whig  (Hilliard).  The  figure 
102  proved  to  be  Mr.  Winthrop's  high-water  mark, 
which  he  repeatedly  attained,  but  never  exceeded.  Not 
long  afterward,  the  Democratic  managers  thought  it 
good  policy  to  drop  Cobb  for  the  time  being  and  run  a 
Northern  Democrat.     They  concentrated  first  on  Emery 

D.  Potter  of  Ohio,  and  then  on  William  J.  Brown  of 
Indiana.  The  latter  was  a  dark  horse  who  developed 
surprising  speed,  creeping  up  on  the  thirty-ninth  vote 
to  109,  out  of  a  total  of  226.  Mr.  Winthrop  had  all 
along  offered  to  retire  in  favor  of  some  other  Whig  if 
it  would  help  matters,  but  his  principal  supporters  had 
hitherto  strenuously  objected,  on  the  ground  that  this 
would  only  make  bad  worse.  At  this  juncture,  how- 
ever, Robert  C.  Schenck  of   Ohio  and  Edward  Stanly 


98  A  MEMOIR  OF 

of  North  Carolina  came  to  him  and  said  :  ''  We  have 
good  reason  to  suspect  Brown  of  double-dealing,  of  hav- 
ing secretly  pledged  himself  to  both  Southern  men  and 
Free-S oilers.  To  gain  time  to  expose  him,  you  must 
now  resign,  and  we  will  make  this  a  pretext  to  force 
an  adjournment,"  —  a  plan  which  was  at  once  carried  out. 
The  next  morning  the  required  evidence  was  not  forth- 
coming, and  on  the  fortieth  vote  Brown  got  112,  need- 
ing but  two  more  to  elect  him.  Just  then  the  cat  was 
let  out  of  the  bag,  in  the  shape  of  a  letter  from  Brown 
agreeing  to  appoint  committees  satisfactory  to  the  Free- 
Soilers,  in  return  for  their  eventual  support.  This  dis- 
covery caused  much  excitement,  and  a  revulsion  of 
feeling.  Had  a  vote  then  been  taken,  and  had  Mr. 
Winthrop  been  still  the  Whig  candidate,  it  is  probable 
that  he  would  have  been  chosen.  As  it  was,  the  House 
adjourned,  and  the  next  day  the  Democrats  precipitated 
an  angry  debate.  For  some  time  after,  both  parties 
scattered  their  votes,  ultimately  reverting  to  the  ori- 
ginal nominees.  A  variety  of  compromises  were  ad- 
vocated, among  others  the  amusing  one  that  Mr. 
Winthrop  and  Mr.  Cobb  should  draw  lots  for  the 
Speakership  ;  but  in  the  end  it  was  agreed  that,  in- 
stead of  a  majority,  a  plurality  should  determine. 
Before  this  new  rule  went  into  operation,  Stanly  of 
North  Carolina,  Conrad  of  Louisiana,  and  Houston  of 
Delaware  labored  hard  with  the  five  recalcitrant 
Southern  Whigs,  pointing  out  to  Toombs  and  Stephens 
in  particular  that  Taylor,  a  Southern  man  and  a  slave- 
owner, had  been  their  original  choice  for  President,  and 
that,  by  conniving  at  a  Democratic  Speaker,  they  were 
giving   the    administration   a   set-back   at   the   outset, 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  99 

besides  inflicting  a  profound  and  perhaps  irreparable 
injury  upon  the  Whig  party.  There  was  some  little 
wavering,  but  the  iron  will  of  Toombs  (much  the  ablest 
of  the  phalanx)  held  fast  his  associates,  though,  as  the 
result  showed,  if  even  four  of  them  could  have  been 
won  back  to  their  allegiance,  Mr.  Winthrop  would  have 
been  elected.^  The  sixty-third  and  final  vote  (Dec.  22, 
1849)  was  as  follows  :  Cobb,  102  ;  Winthrop,  99 ;  scat- 
tering, 20 ;  this  scattering  vote  consisting  of  nine  Free- 
Soilers,  two  Independent  Northern  Democrats,  two 
Independent  Southern  Democrats,  and  the  five  dis- 
affected Southern  Whigs  just  alluded  to.^ 

In  view  of  all  this,  it  is  a  little  surprising  that  in  the 
"  History  of  the  Eebellion,"  published  by  Mr.  Giddings 
in  1864,  and  in  other  equally  trustworthy  works  of 
reference,  the  statement  should  be  made  that  Mr, 
Winthrop  owed  his  defeat  to  "  his  devotion  to  the  in- 
terests of  slavery.''  That  such  an  impression,  however, 
was  widely  current  at  the  time  in  certain  circles  would 
seem  established  by  the  following  paragraph  from  a 
leading  abolition  newspaper:  — 

"  That  lickspittle  of  slavery,  Robert  C.  Winthrop  —  a 
doughface  of  showy  but  mediocre  ability,  the  self-satisfied  and 
self-sufficient  agfent  of  the  wealth  of  Boston  —  has  fallen 
under  the  wheels  of  the  bright  car  of  Liberty.  Thanks  be 
to  Heaven  for  this  victory,  small  as  it  is ! " 

^  In  justice  to  these  four  gentlemen,  it  should  be  stated  that  their 
opposition  was  entirely  courteous,  and  they  expressed  regret  that  they 
could  not  conscientiously  vote  for  one  whom  they  personally  liked. 

2  It  should  be  added  that  neither  in  this,  nor  in  many  of  the  preceding 
votes,  did  either  party  poll  its  full  strength,  there  being  several  pairs. 
Pairs,  however,  do  not  affect  a  result.  In  this  last  vote  Mr.  Winthrop 
lost  the  support  of  the  one  Free-Soiler  who  had  hitherto  voted  for  him 
(Howe),  but  the  gap  was  made  good  by  Tuck  of  New  Hampshire,  who 
then  voted  for  him  for  the  first  time. 


100  A  MEMOIR   OF 

In  an  eloquent  speech  in  Congress  on  the  13th  of 
December  (listened  to  by  the  writer  of  this  memoir), 
Mr.  Toombs  had  said :  — 

"  I  do  not  act  with  them  [the  Whigs]  because  the  events 
of  the  past,  the  present,  and  the  future  force  the  conviction 
on  my  mind  that  the  interests  of  my  section  of  the  Union 
are  in  danger,  and  I  am  therefore  unwilling  to  surrender 
the  great  power  of  the  Speaker's  chair  without  obtaining 
security  for  the  future." 

In  a  subsequent  letter  of  explanation  to  his  constitu- 
ents he  went  more  into  particulars,  as  follows  :  — 

"  When  Congress  met,  in  December,  I  found  there  was  a 
strong  and  nearly  unanimous  disposition  on  the  part  of 
Northern  Whig  members  to  interpolate  the  old  Whig  creed 
with  Free-Soil  opinions.  The  same  disposition  strongly 
manifested  itself  also  among  Northern  Democrats,  though 
not  to  the  same  extent.  Four  years'  experience  in  Congress 
had  taught  me  the  importance  of  the  organization  of  the 
House  to  the  success  or  defeat  of  public  measures.  After  a 
free,  full,  and  unsatisfactory  conference  in  caucus  with  the 
Northern  Whigs,  I  determined  not  to  co-operate  with  them 
in  the  election  of  Speaker,  without  some  security  upon  the 
slavery  question.  I  found  them,  with  but  few  exceptions, 
pledged  and  determined  to  engraft  the  Wilmot  Proviso  upon 
Territorial  bills  for  the  government  of  New  Mexico  and 
Utah,  and  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  district  of  Columbia.  A 
resolution  submitted  by  me  to  the  caucus  in  opposition  to 
the  passage  of  any  such  laws  was  promptly  rejected,  and  I, 
together  with  those  who  acted  with  me,  as  promptly  with- 
drew from  the  caucus  and  resisted,  by  all  means  in  our 
power,  the  election  of  its  nominee,  Mr.  Winthrop.  The 
struggle  for  the  Speakership  resulted  in  the  election  of  a 
representative  from  our  own  State,  whose  able  and  efficient 
administration  of  its  duties  has  thus  far  been  highly  honor- 
able and  beneficial." 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  101 

Aside  from  his  gratitude  to  the  political  friends  who 
had  stood  by  him  so  manfully  in  this  contest,  Mr.  Win- 
throp  was  pleased  that  Horace  Mann,  between  whose 
opinions  and  his  own  there  was  something  of  a  gulf, 
should  not  only  have  steadily  voted  for  him  from  first 
to  last,  but  have  endeavored  (so  he  was  informed)  to 
persuade  others  to  do  so.  Many  years  later  he  read 
with  interest  the  following  extracts  from  Mann's  let- 
ters on  this  subject :  — 

[Dec.  22.  1849.]  "  I  have  voted  for  Mr.  Winthrop  and  in 
that  way  have  fulfilled  the  hopes  of  the  Whigs.  He  was 
their  first  choice ;  he  is  only  my  second  or  third :  yet,  as  he 
is  the  best  man  we  could  possibly  elect,  I  have  supported 
him.  Just  so  much  undeserved  credit  as  I  get  from  the 
Whigs,  just  so  much  undeserved  censure  I  shall  get  from  the 
Free-Soilers." 

[Dec.  23.]  ''  Howell  Cobb  is  Speaker,  one  of  the  fiercest, 
sternest,  strongest,  proslavery  men  in  all  the  South.  .  .  . 
And  by  whom  was  he  allowed  to  be  elevated  to  this  important 
post  ?  By  the  Free-Soilers,  who,  at  any  time  during  the  last 
three  weeks,  might  have  prevented  it,  and  who  permitted  it 
last  night  when  the  fact  stared  them  full  in  the  face.  Mr. 
Winthrop  was  not  unexceptionable,  it  is  true;  but  what  a 
vast  difference  between  him  and  an  avowed  champion  of 
slavery,  with  all  the  South  at  his  back  to  force  him  on,  and 
at  his  ear  to  minister  counsel !  How  strange  that  love  of  a 
good  thing  which  destroys  it!  Now  we  shall  have  pro- 
slavery  committees.  All  the  power  and  patronage  of  the 
Speaker,  and  it  is  great,  will  be  on  the  wrong  side ;  and  this 
has  been  permitted  by  those  who  clamor  most  against  all 
forbearance  toward  slavery,  when  by  a  breath  they  might 
have  prevented  it."^ 

It  is  not  essential  to  recount  the  part  taken  in  debate 

1  Life  of  Mann,  pp.  283-284. 


102  A  MEMOIR  OF 

by  Mr.  Winthrop  for  a  month  or  two  after  he  returned 
to  the  floor.  It  is  all  to  be  found  m  the  "  Congressional 
Globe."  His  first  speech  of  real  importance  was  de- 
livered on  the  21st  of  February,  1850,  and  was  entitled 
Personal  Vindication.  While  he  continued  to  be  a 
candidate  for  Speaker,  he  had  preferred  not  to  be 
drawn  into  any  discussion  of  his  conduct ;  but  he  had 
always  intended  to  take  some  opportunity  to  defend 
himself,  and  an  occasion  was  furnished  by  a  fresh 
attack,  this  time  from  Joseph  A.  Root  of  Ohio  (a 
former  Whig,  then  an  active  Free-Soiler),  who  accused 
Mr.  Winthrop  and  others  of  having  "skulked"  a  par- 
ticular vote.^  In  replying  to  Mr.  Root  he  was  able  to 
deal  with  previous  assailants  and  at  some  length.  "  I 
have  no  expectation,"  he  more  than  once  remarked  in 
his  old  age,  "  that  my  political  career  w^ill  excite  the 
smallest  interest  in  the  distant  future,  but  I  should  be 
glad  if  any  one  curious  in  such  matters  would  turn  to 
this  particular  speech  and  read  it  from  beginning  to 
end."  I  give  a  few  extracts  to  convey  some  idea  of  its 
flavor : — 

It  appears  to  have  been  the  studious  policy  of  a  few 
members  of  the  House  to  drag  me  into  the  debate,  whether 
I  would  or  no.  Not  satisfied  with  having  accomplished  my 
defeat  as  a  candidate  for  re-election  to  the  Speaker's  chair, 
they  have  made  it  their  special  business  to  provoke  and 
taunt  me  by  unworthy  reflections  upon  my  political  and 
official  conduct ;  and  more  than  one  of  them  has  not  scrupled 
to  assail  me  with  the  coarsest  and  most  unwarrantable  per- 
sonalities.   It  is  my  purpose,  sir,  at  this  moment  to  notice  some 

^  The  "  Globe"  has  it  "  dodged,"  but  Mr.  Winthrop,  who  was  listen- 
ing to  a  debate  in  the  Senate  at  the  time,  was  informed  that  the  word 
really  used  was  "  skulked." 


EGBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  103 

of  these  unmannerly  assaults ;  and  no  one  will  be  surprised, 
I  think,  if  I  should  be  found  doing  so  in  no  very  mincing  or 
measured  terms.  Hardly  had  I  reached  the  capital  before  I 
found  myself  held  up,  at  the  length  of  three  or  four  columns, 
in  the  Democratic  organ  of  this  city,  as  a  desperate  Aboli- 
tionist. The  Abolition  papers,  in  reply,  exhibited  me  at  equal 
length,  as  indeed  they  had  often  done  before,  as  a  rank  pro- 
slavery  man.  The  honorable  member  from  Tennessee  [Mr. 
Andrew  Johnson]  coming  next  to  the  onslaught,  and  doing 
me  the  favor  to  rehearse  before  my  face  a  speech  which  he 
had  delivered  behind  my  back  at  the  last  session,  arraigned 
me  in  the  most  ferocious  terms  as  having  prostituted  the  pre- 
rogatives of  the  Chair  to  sectional  purposes,  and  as  having 
framed  all  my  committees  in  a  manner  and  with  a  view  to 
do  injustice  to  the  South.  The  honorable  member  from 
Ohio  [Mr.  Giddings],  following  him,  after  a  due  delay,  de- 
nounced me  with  equal  violence  as  having  packed  the  most 
important  of  these  committees  for  the  purpose  of  betraying 
the  North.  The  one  proclaimed  me  to  be  the  very  author 
and  originator  of  the  Wilmot  Proviso.  The  other  reproached 
me  as  being  a  downright,  or  at  best,  a  disguised  enemy  to 
that  proviso.  The  one  exclaimed,  as  the  very  climax  of  his 
condemnation,  '  I  would  sooner  vote  for  Joshua  R.  Giddings 
himself  than  for  Robert  C.  Winthrop.'  The  other  responded 
with  an  equally  indignant  emphasis,  '  I  would  sooner  vote 
for  Howell  Cobb  than  for  Robert  C.  Winthrop, — he  cannot 
do  worse,  he  may  do  better.' 

The  honorable  members  from  Tennessee  and  Ohio  have 
not  been  the  only  contributors  to  this  most  amiable,  consist- 
ent, and  harmonious  testimony  in  regard  to  my  public  conduct 
and  character.  An  honorable  colleague  from  Massachusetts 
[Mr.  Allen]  has  cast  in  his  mite  also,  both  by  prompting 
others  at  his  elbow,  and  by  the  manlier  method  of  direct 
accusation.  He,  too,  has  charged  me  with  having  arranged 
certain  committees  with  the  deliberate  purpose  of  preventing 
the  action  which  Northern  men  demanded.     And  more  re- 


104  A  MEMOIR   OF 

cently,  again,  an  honorable  member  from  Virginia  [Mr. 
Morton]  in  a  speech  which,  I  take  pleasure  in  saying,  was 
characterized  by  entire  courtesy,  if  not  by  entire  justice,  has 
told  the  House  and  his  constituents  that  he  voted  against  me 
for  Speaker  because  he  believed  me  to  be  in  favor  of  the 
Wilmot  Proviso ;  because  he  believed  me  to  be  in  favor  of 
the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia;  and 
because  my  name  was  found  in  a  minority  of  forty-five 
against  the  admission  of  Florida  as  a  slave  State. 

If  my  name  were  a  little  less  humble  than  I  feel  it  this  day 
to  be,  —  if  I  were  not  conscious  how  small  a  claim  it  has  to 
be  classed  among  the  great  names,  even  of  our  own  age  and 
country,  much  more  of  the  world,  —  I  should  be  tempted 
to  console  myself  under  these  conflicting  accusations  with 
those  noble  lines  of  Milton  which,  as  it  is,  I  cannot  but 
remember :  — 

*  Fame,  if  not  double-faced,  is  double-mouthed, 
And  with  contrary  blast  proclaims  most  deeds ; 
On  both  his  wings,  one  black,  the  other  white, 
Bears  greatest  names  in  his  wild  aery  flight.* 

.  .  .  Sir,  when  I  was  first  a  candidate  for  Congress,  now 
some  ten  winters  gone,  I  told  the  Abolitionists  of  my  district, 
in  reply  to  their  interrogatories,  that,  while  I  agreed  with 
them  in  most  of  their  abstract  principles,  and  was  ready  to 
carry  them  out  in  any  just,  practicable,  and  constitutional 
manner,  yet,  if  I  were  elected  to  this  House,  I  should  not 
regard  it  as  any  peculiar  part  of  my  duty  to  agitate  the  sub- 
ject of  slavery.  I  have  adhered  to  that  declaration.  I  have 
been  no  agitator.  I  have  sympathized  with  no  fanatics.  I 
have  defended  the  rights  and  interests  and  principles  of  the 
North,  to  the  best  of  my  ability,  wherever  and  whenever  I 
have  found  them  assailed ;  but  I  have  enlisted  in  no  crusade 
upon  the  institutions  of  the  South.  I  have  eschewed  and 
abhorred  ultraism  at  both  ends  of  the  Union.  '  A  plague  o' 
both  your  houses  '  has  been  my  constant  ejaculation ;  and  it 
is  altogether  natural,  therefore,  that  both  their  houses  should 


ROBERT  C.    WINTHROP.  105 

cry  a  plague  on  me !  I  would  not  have  it  otherwise.  I 
covet  their  opposition.  I  dote  on  their  dislike.  I  desire  no 
other  testimony  to  the  general  propriety  of  my  own  course 
than  their  reproaches.  I  thank  my  God  that  he  has  endowed 
me,  if  with  no  other  gifts,  with  a  spirit  of  moderation,  which 
incapacitates  me  for  giving  satisfaction  to  ultraists  anywhere 
and  on  any  subject.  If  they  were  to  speak  well  of  me,  I 
should  be  compelled  to  exclaim,  like  one  of  old,  '  What  bad 
thing  have  I  done,  that  such  men  praise  me  ? '  .  .  . 

The  honorable  member  [Mr.  Root],  in  the  course  of  a 
speech  in  which  he  has  misrepresented  and  assailed  at  least 
one-half  of  the  Northern  members  of  this  House,  has  told  us 
that  he  was  a  member  of  'the  reviled  Free-Soil  sect.'  Good 
heavens,  sir,  if  tliey  are  the  reviled,  who  are  the  revilers,  and 
what  must  they  be?  Never,  in  the  whole  history  of  our 
country,  —  never,  since  the  existence  of  political  parties  any- 
where, —  has  there  been  a  party  which,  under  the.  pretext  of 
philanthropy,  has  so  revelled  and  luxuriated  in  malice, 
hatred,  and  uncharitableness  —  in  vituperation,  calumny,  and 
slander  —  as  this  'reviled  Free-Soil  sect.'  I  speak  of  their 
principal  leaders  and  organs,  as  I  know  them  in  my  own  part 
of  the  country,  and  not  of  the  great  mass  of  their  followers, 
there  and  elsewhere,  who,  I  doubt  not,  are  led  along  by 
honest  impulses,  and  many  of  whom,  I  as  little  doubt,  are 
disgusted  with  the  music  of  their  own  trumpeters.  Never, 
sir,  I  repeat,  has  there  been  witnessed  in  this  country,  or  on 
the  face  of  the  globe,  such  an  audacity  of  false  statement 
and  false  accusation  as  that  with  which  some  of  their  presses 
have  teemed.  Never  have  there  been  baser  stabs  at  char- 
acter than  those  with  which  some  of  their  speeches  have 
reeked !  I  need  not  say  that  I  have  had  my  full  share,  and 
more  than  my  full  share,  of  their  misrepresentation  and 
abuse.  I  bear  no  special  malice  towards  members  of  this 
House  who  deal  with  me  in  this  style,  because  I  know  that, 
after  all,  they  are  but  the  instruments  and  mouth-pieces  of 
others  afar  off.     There  is  a  little  nest  of  vipers,  sir,  in  my 


106  A  MEMOIR  OF 

own  immediate  district  and  its  vicinity,  who  have  been  biting 
a  file  for  three  or  four  years  past,  and  who,  having  fairly 
used  up  their  own  teeth,  have  evidently  enlisted  in  their 
service  the  fresher  fangs  of  some  honorable  members  of  this 
House.  '  Odisse  quern  Icederis.^  Conscious  that  they  have 
wronged  me,  they  now  hate  me ;  and  having  been  thoroughly 
put  down  at  home,  they  have  turned  prompters  and  pan- 
derers  to  assaults  upon  me  here.  .  .  . 

Sir,  I  have  done  with  these  personalities.  They  have  not 
been  of  my  seeking.  They  are  unnatural  and  revolting  to 
my  disposition.  I  am  entirely  new  to  this  style  of  debate. 
During  a  ten  years'  occupancy  of  a  seat  in  this  House,  I  have 
never  before  had  occasion  to  resort  to  it.  But  I  could  no 
longer  submit  in  silence  to  such  gross  and  groundless  asser- 
tions. Gentlemen  may  vote  against  me  whenever  they 
please.  There  is  no  office  in  the  gift  of  the  House,  of  the 
people,  or  of  the  President,  which  I  covet,  or  for  which  I 
would  quarrel  with  any  one  for  not  giving  me  his  support. 
But  no  man  shall  slander  me  with  impunity.  No  man  shall 
pervert  and  misrepresent  my  words  and  acts,  and  falsify  the 
record  of  my  public  career,  without  exposure.  That  career 
has  been  one  of  humble  pretension,  and  presents  no  claim  of 
distinguished  service  of  any  sort.  But  such  as  it  is,  I  am 
willing  that  it  should  be  investigated.  Examine  the  record. 
There  may  be  votes  upon  it  which  require  explanation ;  votes 
about  which  honest  men  may  differ;  votes  as  to  which  I 
may  have  doubted  at  the  time,  and  may  still  doubt.  But 
examine  the  record  fairly  and  candidly ;  nothing  extenuate, 
nor  set  down  aught  in  malice ;  and  you  will  find  that  I  have 
neither  been  false  to  the  North  nor  to  the  South,  to  the  East 
nor  to  the  West.  You  will  find  that  while  I  have  been  true 
to  my  constituents,  I  have  been  true,  also,  to  the  Constitu- 
tion and  the  Union.  This,  at  least,  I  know,  sir,  —  my  con- 
science this  day  bearing  me  witness,  —  that  I  have  been  true 
to  myself,  to  my  own  honest  judgment,  to  my  own  clear 
convictions  of  right,  of  duty,  and  of  patriotism. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  107 

This  speech,  like  most  of  its  predecessors,  was  circu- 
lated as  a  pamphlet  at  the  time,  but  when,  several  years 
later,  it  was  included  in  a  volume  for  permanent  refer- 
ence, Mr.  Winthrop  appended  the  following  foot-note  to 
the  sentence  referring  to  certain  persons  living  in  and 
near  his  Congressional  district :  — 

For  this  application  of  the  old  fable  of  The  Viper  and  the 
File^  as  well  as  for  some  of  the  other  sharpnesses  and  severi- 
ties of  this  speech  (which  is  here  given  precisely  as  it  was 
delivered  and  published  at  the  time),  the  plea  of  the  old 
Roman  Fabulist  may  be  employed :  — 

*  Excedit  animus  quern  proposuit  terminum  j 
Sed  diflBculter  continetur  spiritus, 
Integritatis  qui  sincerse  conscius 
A  noxiorum  premitur  insolentiis.' 

What  Yon  Hoist  calls  "  the  well-known  disreputable 
practice  of  American  politicians,"  in  materially  revising 
speeches  after  delivery,  —  a  practice  sanctioned  by  emi- 
nent examples,  —  was  to  him  objectionable.  If  subse- 
quent events  now  and  then  modified  in  some  degree  an 
opinion  he  had  expressed  of  men  or  things,  he  always 
preferred  to  let  the  record  stand,  rather  than  allow 
room  for  the  imputation  that  he  had  suppressed  or 
altered  anything  to  suit  any  change  of  political  circum- 
stances or  of  public  sentiment.  In  reproducing  at  this 
late  day  a  few  of  the  "  sharpnesses  and  severities " 
above  alluded  to,  I  do  so  with  no  disposition  to  revive 
unpleasant  memories,  —  still  less  to  give  offence,  —  but 
only  because,  in  my  judgment,  a  biography  of  a  public 
man  is  of  little  value  unless  it  shows  clearly  how  he 
felt  at  critical  periods,  —  especially  at  moments  when  he 
believed  himself   deeply   wronged,  —  and   this   is   best 


108  A  MEMOIR   OF 

done  by  using  the  words  actually  uttered  by  bim  at 
the  time.  Setting  aside  the  matter  of  this  speech,  the 
manner  of  it  is  described  with  some  minuteness  in  the 
following  passages  from  a  letter  to  the  Boston  "  Courier/' 
dated  Washington,  Feb.  22,  1850,  written  by  James  S. 
Pike,  then  a  well-known  newspaper  writer,  afterward 
minister  to  the  Netherlands :  — 

"  I  listened  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  in  a  set  speech,  yesterday,  for 
the  first  time.  It  was  pronounced  to  be  one  of  his  best,  and 
it  was  certainly  a  speech  of  uncommon  merit,  commanding 
the  close  attention  of  the  House.  .  .  .  He  declaimed  with 
great  animation  in  a  highly  finished  style  of  elocution.  His 
remarks  were  wire-woven.  No  broken  threads  or  ravelled 
edges  marred  any  portion.  He  has  this  great  advantage  as 
a  speaker.  His  mind  is  eminently  methodical,  his  recoUec- 
tive  faculties  are  strong,  active,  and  in  constant  play,  at  the 
same  time  that  he  is  in  the  full  swing  of  extempore  composi- 
tion. Such  faculties  are  invaluable  to  a  public  speaker. 
They  are  the  flying  columns,  the  mounted  forces,  of  his 
mental  battalions.  The  heavy  artillery  of  the  intellect  may 
open  breaches,  and  even  break  the  line  of  the  enemy,  but  the 
light  troops  are  essential  to  make  clean  work  with  the  par- 
tially discomfited  foe.  Mr.  Winthrop  illustrated  the  great 
value  of  these  subordinate  forces  on  this  occasion,  in  his 
apt  running  fire  of  allusion  and  quotation.  His  memory 
played  the  tender  to  his  understanding,  and  handed  him  up 
grape-shot  and  canister,  which  he  threw  into  his  adversaries' 
camp  with  great  effect,  in  the  intervals  of  his  broadside 
discharges.  .  .  .  The  methodical  character  of  Mr.  Winthrop's 
mind  enables  him  to  avoid  all  confusion  or  transposition  in 
the  treatment  of  his  topics  of  debate.  He  neither  runs 
before,  nor  lags  behind,  the  proper  current  of  his  speech. 
He  not  only  says  just  what  he  designs  to  say,  but  he  says  it 
just  where  and  when  he  intends  to  say  it;  moreover,  he  says 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  109 

it  in  the  manner  designed.  His  thoughts  are  run  in  a  mould, 
and  his  expressions  daguerreotyped  for  the  hearer.  They  are 
used  like  the  pieces  of  a  dissected  map,  and  when  his  work 
is  done,  you  see  that  every  piece  is  put  in  its  proper  place 
and  that  the  map  is  harmoniously  and  accurately  complete. 
These  distinguishing  characteristics  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  mind, 
added  to  strong  powers  of  intellect,  great  coolness  and  self- 
possession,  unusual  gifts  of  language,  a  chaste  elocution, 
sufficient  force  and  animation,  with  an  accomplished  and 
dignified  manner,  render  him  a  pleasing,  an  effective,  and  a 
reliable  debater.  Notwithstanding  the  great  amount  and 
variety  of  talent  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  I  do  not 
know  to  whom  we  are  to  look  in  that  body  as  his  superior." 


YI. 


It  was  a  great  regret  to  Mr.  Winthrop  that  Mr.  Clay, 
on  his  return  to  the  Senate  after  some  years'  absence, 
instead  of  proposing  a  compromise  measure  of  his  own, 
should  not  have  been  willing  to  lend  his  powerful  and 
pre-eminent    influence   in    aid   of    President    Taylor's 
scheme  of  adjustment,  which,  though  not  the  plan  of 
all  others  which  Mr.  Winthrop  would  have  preferred, 
seemed  to  him  both  practical    and  practicable,  calcu- 
lated to  allay  Southern   sensibilities  while    sufficiently 
vindicating    Northern    principles,     and    affording    the 
surest  hope  of  the  maintenance  of  domestic   peace  and 
the  preservation   of   the   Union.     In  various    quarters 
a  disposition  was  manifested  to  thwart  General  Taylor's 
views  and  embarrass  his  administration,  to   the   great 
chagrin  of  some  of  his  staunch  friends,  among  whom 
was  Edward  Stanly  of  North  Carolina,  already  alluded 


110  A  MEMOIR  OF 

to  as  one  of  the  leading  members  of  the  House^  who 
came  to  Mr.  Winthrop  shortly  after  Mr.  Clay  had 
introduced  his  celebrated  Resolutions,  and  said  sub- 
stantially as  follows  :  — 

"  I  am  very  anxious  Webster  should  know  that  if  he  can 
see  his  way  clear  to  indoi'se  the  plan  of  the  Administration, 
Taylor's  Southern  supporters  are  prepared  to  do  their  best  to 
make  him  the  next  President.  We  pressed  Taylor  two  years 
ago  merely  because  it  seemed  the  best  chance  of  ousting  the 
Democrats,  but  he  has  no  idea  of  running  again,  and  Clay 
is  too  old  to  be  considered,  though  he  cannot  be  made  to 
realize  it.  The  extravagancies  of  men  like  Toombs  and 
Stephens  threaten  to  wreck  the  party.  We  are  ready  to 
support  Webster  on  a  moderate  platform." 

This  message  was  confidentially  communicated  to 
Mr.  Webster  by  Mr.  Winthrop,  when  a  long  conver- 
sation ensued,  Mr.  Webster  stating  that  he  had  not 
pledged  himself  to  sustain  Clay's  Resolutions,  but  was 
revolving  the  subject  in  his  mind,  that  he  was  unable 
to  see  the  necessity  for  raising  any  question  over  the 
restriction  of  slavery  by  attempting  to  organize  Terri- 
torial governments  in  New  Mexico  and  Utah,  and  that 
he  thought  well  of  the  general  drift  of  the  President's 
policy.  "  In  short,"  he  finally  added,  "  I  am  substan- 
tially with  the  President,  and  you  can  tell  Mr.  Stanly 
so."^     When,  therefore,  at  the  close  of  his  speech  of 

1  It  is  interesting  to  compare  this  anecdote  with  the  following  ex- 
tract from  the  accredited  biography  of  Webster  :  "  IVith  the  exception 
of  the  interview  between  Mr.  Clay  and  Mr.  Webster  in  January,  I  am  not 
aware  that  any  one  sought  to  ascertain  what  course  the  latter  intended 
to  pursue  in  regard  to  the  pending  sectional  controversy.  There  is  no 
evidence  whatever  among  his  private  papers  which  would  warrant  the 
belief  that  he  was  consulted  or  approached  by  any  person  in  public  life 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  Ill 

February  21,  1850,  Mr.  Winthrop  alluded  with  appro- 
bation to  General  Taylor's  scheme  of  adjustment, 
stating  that  he  should  take  some  early  opportunity 
of  developing  his  views  thereon,  he  was  under  the 
impression  that  Mr.  Webster  was  in  general  accord 
with  him,  and  he  was  confirmed  in  this  idea  when 
the  latter  called  at  his  house  the  next  morning  and  left 
a  message  of  congratulation.  The  day  but  one  after, 
Mr.  Winthrop  was  summoned  to  Boston  by  the  danger- 
ous illness  of  a  near  relative,  and  did  not  get  back  to 
Washington  till  nearly  a  fortnight  later.  What  fol- 
lowed is  best  described  by  the  following  extracts  from 
his  notes  :  ^  — 

The  evening  of  my  return  (March  6)  I  pulled  Mr.  Web- 
ster's door-bell,2  thinking  he  might  be  glad  to  see  some  one 
fresh  from  Boston  before  making  his  speech  the  next  day. 
His  servant  said  he  was  very  busy,  but  added  that  he  knew 
he  would  see  me^  and  insisted  upon  showing  me  up  to  his 
study.  I  found  him  in  the  last  agonies  of  preparation,  and 
in  the  act  of  dictating  passages  to  his  son  Fletcher.     I  apol- 

with  suggestions  of  a  political  character,  nor  did  I  ever  hear  of  such  an 
occurrence  having  taken  place.  ...  As  early  as  December,  1819,  he 
learned  from  President  Taylor  and  the  members  of  his  Administration 
what  convinced  him  that  a  dangerous  policy  was  likely  to  be  pursued  by 
the  Executive,  and  that  a  different  and  more  comprehensive  plan  of 
general  pacification  must  be  pursued."  Life  of  Daniel  Webster,  by 
G.  T.  Curtis,  vol.  ii.  p.  402,  n. 

1  The  essential  facts  contained  in  these  notes  were  embodied  in  a 
paper  prepared  by  Mr.  AVinthrop  soon  after  Mr.  Webster's  death,  and 
privately  printed  by  him  in  1872.  The  pamphlet  was  entitled  "  A 
Chapter  of  Autobiography,"  but  as  it  was  intended  only  for  its  author's 
convenient  reference  and  to  be  shown  to  a  few  intimate  friends,  but  six 
copies  were  stricken  off,  and  it  is  now  extremely  rare. 

2  Mr.  Webster  and  Mr.  Winthrop  lived  near  one  another,  the  former 
in  Louisiana  Avenue,  the  latter  in  C.  Street,  in  a  house  subsequently 
associated  with  Vice-President  King. 


112  A  MEMOIR  OF 

ogized  for  disturbing  him  and  was  making  off,  when  he 
called  out,  '  What  say  our  friends  in  Boston  ? '  I  replied  that 
I  thought  them  satisfied  with  the  President's  policy  and  not 
disposed  to  press  matters  to  a  dangerous  pass  upon  the 
Wilmot  Proviso.  He  then  said,  '  I  have  not  told  a  human 
being  what  I  am  going  to  say  to-morrow,  but  as  you  are  here 
at  the  last  moment,  I  will  say  to  you  that  I  don't  mean  to 
have  anything  to  do  with  the  proviso.'  It  was  not  a  pro- 
pitious time  to  ask  questions  or  to  make  suggestions,  and 
after  a  little  talk  with  Mrs.  Webster  in  the  drawing-room, 
I  left  the  house.  The  next  day  I  listened  to  the  speech  and 
immediately  after  its  conclusion  went  home  to  dinner. 
Before  I  had  risen  from  the  table,  Vinton  appeared.  *  Did 
you  hear  that  speech,'  said  he,  '  and  what  do  you  think  of 
it  ? '  I  replied  that  we  generally  thought  alike  in  such 
matters.  He  was  a  good  deal  moved  and  exclaimed,  '  If  that 
speech  goes  to  the  country  just  as  it  was  spoken,  without 
qualification  or  explanation,  it  will  do  infinite  mischief,  and 
overturn  every  Whig  State  north  of  the  Potomac.  We  can- 
not stand  it  in  Ohio.  They  will  not  stand  it  in  New  York, 
and  even  he  cannot  make  it  go  down  in  Massachusetts* 
It  is  not  so  much  what  he  has  said  as  his  way  of  saying  it, 
and  the  things  he  has  omitted.  In  the  abstract,  it  is  a  grand 
speech  and  a  patriotic  one,  but  he  will  be  understood  as  going 
farther  than  he  really  intends.  Tlie  Whig  party  can  stand 
upon  General  Taylor's  policy ;  upon  any  other,  it  must  fall. 
Pray  go  and  beg  him  to  revise  certain  passages.'  I  replied 
that  while  I  regretted  the  speech  as  much  as  he  did,  I 
doubted  the  expediency  of  remonstrating  verbally  with 
Webster  when  he  was  in  the  full  flush  of  a  triumphant 
effort,  surrounded,  as  he  inevitably  would  be,  by  admirers 
who  had  come  to  congratulate  him.  I  thought  it  wiser  to 
put  our  views  on  paper,  as  I  felt  sure  that  a  letter  bearing 
our  joint  names  would  be  considered  by  him  before  he  went 
to  bed.     'If,  however,'    I  added,  'you  think  he  should  be 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  113 

seen  at  once,  you  are  the  man  to  go.  You  are  nearer  his 
age,  you  have  served  him  at  a  pinch,  and  he  cannot  afford 
to  disregard  the  voice  of  Ohio.'  On  reflection,  we  agreed 
to  concoct  a  letter,  which  was  in  my  handwriting,  though 
partly  dictated  by  Vinton.  The  next  afternoon  Webster 
called  and  sat  half  an  hour  with  me.  He  said  he  was 
grateful  to  us  for  the  feelings  which  prompted  our  note, 
which  had  reached  him  too  late ;  that,  owing  to  his  being 
greatly  exhausted,  he  had  gone  to  bed  at  an  unusually  early 
hour,  having  handed  his  notes  to  re2:)orters  in  their  original 
shape ;  but  that  he  had  been  hard  at  work  all  the  morning 
on  a  revision,  in  which  he  had  done  something  to  avoid 
misconstruction,  and  soften  things  which  might  grate  upon 
Northern  feelings ;  that  he  had  inserted  one  or  two  passages 
which  had  been  omitted  in  the  hurr}^  of  delivery,  one  in  par- 
ticular relating  to  the  imprisonment  of  Free  Colored  Seamen. 
As  to  the  President's  plan,  he  said  that  he  had  omitted  all 
allusion  to  it  for  want  of  time,  and  with  a  view  of  making 
it  the  subject  of  a  distinct  speech  hereafter ;  that  he  had 
thought  of  writing  to  the  President  to  explain  this.  '  Why 
not  go  up  to  the  White  House  and  tell  him  so,'  I  replied ; 
'it  is  his  reception  night  and  I  will  call  for  you  with  my 
carriage.'  He  said  he  was  too  tired,  but  would  take  it  as  a 
great  favor  if  I  would  say  from  him  to  the  President,  with 
his  respectful  compliments,  that,  in  order  to  finish  his  speech 
in  one  day,  he  had  omitted  a  number  of  things  he  desired  to 
have  said,  particularly  a  tribute  he  would  gladly  have  paid 
to  the  President's  patriotic  policy,  —  a  policy  which  it  was 
his  purpose  to  discuss  and  advocate  in  the  Senate.  We  then 
walked  out  together  for  a  short  distance.  As  we  parted,  he 
repeated,  'I  am  in  favor  of  supporting  General  Taylor's 
plan,  unless  he  himself  should  hereafter  see  cause  for  modi- 
f}dng  his  views  so  far  as  to  recommend  the  organization  of 
a  Territorial  Government  for  New  Mexico.'  A  few  hours 
later,  I  told  all  this  to  the  President,  who  said  he  was  a  little 

8 


114  A  MEMOIR   OF 

surprised,  on  reading  a  report  of  the  speech  in  a  morning 
paper,  not  to  find  in  it  a  word  about  the  Administration  or 
its  policy,  but  that  he  should  be  very  glad  of  Mr.  Webster's 
support  whenever  he  saw  fit  to  give  it.  .  .  . 

Some  time  afterward  (I  cannot  recall  the  exact  date)  I 
called  on  Webster  one  afternoon  to  express  my  indignation 
at  the  torrent  of  abuse  and  misrepresentation  which  had  been 
poured  out  upon  him  from  Northern  presses  and  Northern 
pulpits,  and  I  took  occasion  to  add  that  while,  as  he  knew, 
I  was  not  fully  in  accord  with  the  speech,  I  had  exerted 
myself,  wherever  and  whenever  I  was  able,  to  restrain  any- 
thing of  the  nature  of  unfriendly  criticism  or  unjust  insinua- 
tion. He  replied,  '  There  is  one  service  you  can  still  do  me. 
I  would  give  ingots  of  gold  —  ingots  of  gold  —  for  a  suitable 
and  satisfactory  motto  to  a  new  and  handsome  edition  of  that 
speech  which  I  have  in  the  press.  I  should  prefer  a  Latin 
sentence,  but  have  looked  through  Cicero  in  vain.  There  is 
a  verse  in  one  of  Milton's  Latin  poems  which  comes  near 
what  I  want,  but  I  cannot  quite  make  it  fay.  You  are 
strong  in  classical  quotation,  and  though  you  may  not  wholly 
approve  the  speech,  you  ought  to  help  me.'  I  said  I  would 
go  home  and  try.  I  vaguely  remembered  some  excerpts  from 
Livy  which  I  had  made  twenty  years  before  in  a  copy-book 
I  had  recently  brought  to  Washington  for  another  purpose, 
and  I  had  an  idea  one  of  them  might  answer.  As  soon  as 
I  found  it  I  sent  it  round  to  him  with  the  suggestion  that, 
instead  of  using  the  entire  extract,  the  three  words  vera  pro 
gratis  would  be  effective.  Within  ten  minutes  came  back 
the  hasty  line,  '  Just  the  thing,  D.  W. '  I  had  expected  one 
day  to  use  this  quotation  myself,  but  it  was  entirely  at  his 
service,  and  was  so  generally  liked  that  he  had  it  engraved 
on  his  private  seal.  I  once  said  to  him  in  a  laughing  way 
that,  if  I  survived  him,  I  was  entitled  to  that  seal,  and  in 
November  of  the  same  year  he  sent  me,  with  a  kind  note,  a 
massive  seal-ring,  inscribed  '  Vera  i^ro  gratis '  on  the  stone, 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  115 

and  on  the  ring  itself  '  Daniel  Webster  to  R.  C.  Winthrop, 
1850.'  1 

On  the  31st  of  March  died  Calhoun,  for  whom  Mr. 
Winthrop  had  much  admiration  and  whom  he  always 
found  charming  in  social  intercourse,  however  much  he 
might  deplore  his  political  views.  At  the  request  of 
the  South  Carolina  delegation  he  paid  a  brief  tribute 
to  him  in  the  House,  from  which  I  extract  the  follow- 
ing passage :  — 

I  have  been  told  by  more  than  one  adventurous  navigator 
that  it  was  worth  all  the  privations  and  perils  of  a  protracted 
voyage  beyond  the  line  to  obtain  even  a  passing  view  of  the 
Southern  Cross,  —  that  great  constellation  of  the  Southern 
hemisphere.  We  can  imagine,  then,  what  would  be  the 
emotions  of  those  who  have  always  enjoyed  the  light  of  that 
magnificent  luminary,  and  who  have  taken  their  daily  and 
their  nightly  direction  from  its  refulgent  rays,  if  it  were 
suddenly  blotted  out  from  the  sky.  Such  I  can  conceive  to 
be  the  emotions  at  this  hour  of  not  a  few  of  the  honored 
friends  and  associates  whom  I  see  around  me.  Indeed,  no 
one  who  has  been  ever  so  distant  an  observer  of  the  course  of 
public  affairs  for  a  quarter  of  a  century  past,  can  fail  to 
realize  that  a  star  of  the  first  magnitude  has  been  struck  from 
our  political  firmament.  Let  us  hope  that  it  has  only  been 
transferred  to  a  higher  and  purer  sphere,  where  it  may  shine 
with  undimmed  brilliancy  forever.  .  .  . 

The  mere  length  and  variety  of  his  public  services  in 
almost  every  branch  of  the  National  Government,  running 
through   a   continuous   period   of   almost   forty    years,  —  as 

1  Mr.  Winthrop  kept  this  ring  in  a  little  box  with  another  ring,  given 
him  by  Mrs.  John  Quincy  Adams  after  her  husband's  death  and  contain- 
ing the  latter's  hair.  He  valued  both  so  much  that  he  directed  they 
should  be  preserved  as  heirlooms  in  his  family. 


116  A  MEMOIR   OF 

a  member  of  this  House,  as  Secretary  of  War,  as  Vice- 
President  of  the  United  States,  as  Secretary  of  State,  and  as 
a  Senator  from  his  own  adored  and  adoring  South  Carolina, 
—  would  alone  have  secured  him  a  conspicuous  and  perma- 
nent place  upon  our  public  records.  But  he  has  left  better 
titles  to  remembrance  than  any  which  mere  office  can  bestow. 
There  was  an  unsullied  purity  in  his  private  life  ;  there  was 
an  inflexible  integrity  in  his  public  conduct;  there  was  an 
indescribable  fascination  in  his  familiar  conversation ; 
there  was  a  condensed  energy  in  his  formal  discourse  ;  there 
was  a  quickness  of  perception,  a  vigor  of  deduction,  a  direct- 
ness and  a  devotedness  of  purpose,  in  all  that  he  said,  or  wrote, 
or  did ;  there  was  a  Roman  dignity  in  his  whole  Senatorial 
deportment,  which  together  made  up  a  character  which  cannot 
fail  to  be  contemplated  and  admired  to  the  latest  posterity.^ 

It  was  not  until  the  8th  of  May,  1850,  that  Mr. 
Winthrop  succeeded  in  getting  the  floor  for  an  hour's 
speech  on  the  whole  subject  of  the  compromise,  entitling 
it  the  Admission  of  California  and  the  Adjustment  of 
the  Slavery  Question.  His  object  was,  while  standing 
fast  to  his  own  views  previously  adopted  and  expressed, 
to  narrow,  as  far  as  possible,  the  division  between  Mr. 
Webster  and  the  Massachusetts  Whigs,  and  to  present 
a  conciliatory  platform  for  their  reunion.  After  allud- 
ing to  an  old  Swiss  patriot  —  of  whom  he  had  recently 
read  an  account  —  who,  when  the  confederated  Cantons 

1  The  previous  morning,  after  breakfast,  Mr.  Winthrop  and  I  walked 
Tip  Capitol  Hill  to  Mr.  Calhoun's  lodgings  and  stood  beside  his  coffin,  in 
which  he  was  full  as  striking  a  figure  as  he  had  ever  been  in  his  seat  in 
the  Senate.  There  was  no  one  present  but  a  colored  servant,  and  the 
scene  was  severely  simple,  but  never  to  be  forgotten.  As  we  turned 
away,  ]Mr.  Winthrop  remarked,  "  If  there  are  any  antislavery  newspaper 
correspondents  about  at  this  early  hour,  our  errand  will  be  considered 
fresh  evidence  of  my  apostasy  to  Freedom.  But  here  was  a  truly  great 
man,  if  there  ever  was  one. " 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  117 

had  become  so  embittered  against  each  other  by  a  long 
succession  of  mutual  criminations  that  a  dissolution  of 
the  confederacy  was  threatened,  had,  by  his  prudence,  his 
patriotism,  and  his  eloquence,  brought  back  his  distracted 
country  from  the  verge  of  ruin,  he  went  on  to  say :  — 

Sir,  there  is  no  sacrifice  of  personal  opinion,  of  pride  of 
consistency,  of  local  regard,  of  official  position,  of  present 
havings  or  of  future  hopes,  which  I  would  not  willingly  make 
to  play  such  a  part  as  this.  Perhaps  it  may  be  said  that  it 
has  been  played  already.  Perhaps  it  may  be  said  that  a 
voice,  or  voices,  have  already  been  heard  in  the  other  end  of 
the  Capitol,  if  not  in  this,  which  have  stilled  the  angry  storm 
of  fraternal  discord  and  given  us  the  grateful  assurance  that 
all  our  controversies  shall  be  peacefully  settled.  At  any  rate, 
sir,  whether  this  be  so  or  not,  I  am  but  too  sensible  that  it  is 
not  given  to  me,  in  this  hour,  to  attempt  such  a  character. 
And  let  me  add,  that  there  is  one  sacrifice  which  I  could 
never  make,  even  for  all  the  glory  which  might  result  from 
the  successful  performance  of  so  exalted  a  service.  I  mean, 
the  sacrifice  of  my  own  deliberately  adopted  and  honestly 
cherished  principles.  These  I  must  avow,  to-day  and  always. 
These  I  must  stand  to,  here  and  everywhere.  Under  all  cir- 
cumstances, in  all  events,  I  must  follow  the  lead  of  my  own 
conscientious  convictions  of  right  and  duty.  .  .  . 

Still  less,  sir,  have  I  sought  the  floor  for  the  purpose  of 
entering  into  fresh  controversy  with  anybody  in  this  House 
or  elsewhere.  Not  even  the  gratuitous  imputations,  the 
second-hand  perversions,  and  stale  sarcasms  of  the  honorable 
member  from  Connecticut  a  few  days  ago  can  tempt  me  to 
employ  another  hour  of  this  session  in  the  mere  cut  and 
thrust  of  personal  encounter.  I  pass  from  that  honorable 
member  with  the  single  remark,  that  it  required  more  than 
all  his  vehement  and  turgid  declamation  against  others,  who, 
as  he  suggested,  were  shaping  their  course  with  a  view  to 
some  official  promotion  or  reward,  to  make  me,  or,  as  I  think, 


118  A  MEMOIR   OF 

to  make  this  House  forget,  that  the  term  of  one  of  his  own 
Connecticut  Senators  was  soon  about  to  expire,  that  the 
Connecticut  Legislature  was  just  about  to  assemble,  and 
that  the  honorable  member  himself  was  well  understood  to 
be  a  prominent  candidate  for  the  vacancy.  And  I  shall  be 
equally  brief  with  the  distinguished  member  from  Penn- 
sylvania, who  honored  me  with  another  shaft  from  the  self- 
same quiver  on  Friday  last.  As  I  heard  him  pouring  forth 
so  bitter  an  invective,  so  pitiless  a  philippic,  against  Southern 
arrogance  and  Northern  recreancy,  and  as  I  observed  the 
sleek  complacency  with  which  he  seemed  to  congratulate 
himself  that  he  alone  had  been  proof  against  all  the  seduc- 
tions of  patronage  and  all  the  blandishments  of  power,  I 
could  not  help  remembering  that  his  name  was  an  historical 
name  more  than  a  century  ago,  and  the  lines  in  which  a 
celebrated  poet  embalmed  it  for  immortality  came  unbidden 
to  my  lips  :  — 

*  Shall  parts  so  various  aim  at  nothing  new  ? 
He  '11  shine  a  Tully  and  a  Wilmot  too  ! ' 

Mr.  Winthrop  then  proceeded  to  explain  the  course 
hitherto  taken  by  him  with  reference  to  the  restriction 
of  slavery  in  the  Territories,  referring  more  particularly 
to  his  action  from  1845  to  1847,  and  reading  extracts 
from  speeches  already  alluded  to  in  this  memoir. 

I  hold  now  [said  he],  as  I  did  three  years  ago,  that  it  is 
entirely  constitutional  for  Congress  to  apply  the  principles 
of  the  ordinance  of  1787  to  any  territory  which  may  be  added 
to  the  Union.  I  hold  now,  as  I  held  then,  that  the  South 
have  no  right  to  complain  of  such  an  application  of  these 
principles  by  those  of  us  who  have  declared  this  doctrine  in 
advance,  and  who  have  steadily  opposed  all  acquisition  of 
territory.  I  hold  now,  as  I  held  then,  that  their  reproaches 
and  fulminations  ought  to  be  exclusively  reserved  for  those 
among  themselves,  and  for  their  allies  in  other  parts  of  the 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  119 

country,  who  have  persisted  in  bringing  this  territory  into 
the  Union  to  be  the  subject  of  a  great  domestic  struggle.  .  .  . 
Gentlemen  talk  of  settling  the  whole  controversy  which  has 
been  kindled  between  the  North  and  the  South  by  some 
sweeping  compromise,  or  some  comprehensive  plan  of  recon- 
ciliation. I  trust  that  the  controversy  will  be  settled,  sir; 
but  I  most  earnestly  hope  and  pray  that  it  will  not  be  so 
settled  that  we  shall  ever  again  imagine  that  we  can  enter 
with  impunity  on  a  career  of  aggression,  spoliation,  and 
conquest.  This  embittered  strife,  this  protracted  suspense, 
these  tedious  days  and  weeks  and  months  of  anxiety  and 
agitation,  will  have  had  their  full  compensation  and  reward 
if  they  shall  teach  us  never  again  to  forget  the  curse  which 
has  been  pronounced  upon  those  'who  remove  their  neigh- 
bors' landmarks,'  —  if  they  shall  teach  us  to  realize,  in  all 
time  to  come,  that  a  policy  of  peace,  and  of  justice  towards 
others,  is  the  very  law  and  condition  of  our  own  domestic 
harmony.  .  .  . 

I  have  no  faith  in  the  plan  of  raking  open  all  the  subjects 
of  disagreement  and  difference  which  have  existed  at  any 
time  between  different  sections  of  the  country,  with  a  view 
of  attempting  to  bring  them  within  the  influence  of  some 
single  panacea.  Certainly,  sir,  if  such  a  plan  is  to  be  at- 
tempted, we  are  not  to  forget  that  there  are  two  sides  to  the 
question  of  aggression.  The  Southern  States  complain,  on 
the  one  side,  that  some  of  their  runaway  slaves  have  not  been 
delivered  up,  according  to  the  provisions  of  the  Constitution. 
The  Northern  States  complain,  on  the  other  side,  that  some  of 
their  freemen  have  been  seized  and  imprisoned,  contrary  to 
the  provisions  of  the  same  Constitution.  I  will  not  under- 
take to  compare  the  two  grievances ;  but  this  I  do  say,  that 
if  the  one  is  to  be  insisted  on  as  a  subject  for  immediate 
redress  and  reparation,  I  see  not  why  the  other  should  not  be 
also.  For  myself,  I  acknowledge  my  allegiance  to  the  whole 
Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  I  am  willing  to  unite 
in   fulfilling  and  enforcing,   in   all   reasonable   and  proper 


120  A   MEMOIR   OF 

modes,  every  one  of  its  provisions.  I  recognize,  indeed,  a 
Power  above  all  human  law-makers,  and  a  code  above  all 
earthly  constitutions  !  And  whenever  I  perceive  a  plain 
conflict  of  jurisdiction  and  authority  between  the  Constitu- 
tion of  my  country  and  the  laws  of  my  God,  my  course  is 
clear.  I  shall  resign  my  office,  whatever  it  may  be,  and 
renounce  all  connection  with  the  public  service  of  any  sort. 
But  it  is  a  libel  upon  the  Constitution,  and,  what  is  worse,  it 
is  a  libel  upon  the  great  and  good  men  who  framed,  adopted, 
and  ratified  it,  to  assert  or  insinuate  that  there  is  any  such 
inconsistency.  It  is  a  favorite  policy,  I  know,  of  some  of 
the  ultraists  in  my  own  part  of  the  country,  to  stigmatize  the 
Constitution  as  a  proslavery  compact.  I  deny  it.  I  hold,  on 
the  other  hand,  that  it  is  a  pro-liberty  contract,  —  the  most 
effective  that  the  world  has  ever  seen.  Magna  Charta  not 
excepted. 

Mr.  Winthrop  then  discussed  at  some  length  the 
Constitution  in  its  relation  to  slavery,  continuing  :  — 

Undoubtedly,  Mr.  Chairman,  there  are  provisions  in  the 
Constitution  which  involve  us  in  painful  obligations,  and 
from  which  some  of  us  would  rejoice  to  be  relieved;  but 
whenever  any  measure  is  proposed  to  me  for  fulfilling  or 
enforcing  any  one  of  its  clear  obligations  or  express  stipula- 
tions, I  shall  give  to  it  every  degree  of  attention,  considera- 
tion, and  support  which  the  justice,  the  wisdom,  the  propriety, 
and  the  practicability  of  its  peculiar  provisions  may  demand 
or  warrant.  In  legislating,  however,  for  the  restoration  of 
Southern  slaves,  I  shall  not  forget  the  security  of  Northern 
freemen.  Nor  in  testifying  my  allegiance  to  what  has  been 
termed  the  extradition  clause  of  the  Constitution,  shall  I 
overlook  those  great  fundamental  principles  of  all  free  gov- 
ernments, —  the  Haheas  Corpus  and  the  Trial  by  Jury. 

He  then  proceeded  to  warmly  advocate  the  immediate 
admission  of  California  with  her  existing  Constitution. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTIIROP.  121 

It  is  said  [he  added]  that  this  Constitution  has  been 
cooked.  Who  cooked  it?  That  her  people  have  been  tam- 
pered with.  Who  tampered  with  them  ?  As  has  been  truly 
said,  we  have  a  Southern  President  and  a  majority  of  South- 
ern men  in  the  Cabinet ;  and  they  sent  a  Southern  agent  — 
a  Georgia  member  of  Congress  —  a  gentleman,  let  me  say, 
for  whose  character  and  conduct  I  have  the  highest  respect 
—  to  bear  their  despatches  and  communicate  their  views  to 
the  California  settlers.  It  is  said  that  these  settlers  are  a 
wild,  reckless,  floating  population,  bent  only  upon  digging 
gold,  and  unworthy  to  be  trusted  in  establishing  a  govern- 
ment. Sir,  I  do  not  believe  a  better  class  of  emigrants  was 
ever  found  flocking  in  such  numbers  to  any  new  settlement 
on  the  face  of  the  earth.  The  immense  distance,  the  formid- 
able difficulties,  and  the  onerous  expense  of  the  pilgrimage  to 
California,  necessarily  confined  the  emigration  to  men  of 
some  pecuniary  substance  as  well  as  to  men  of  more  than 
ordinary  physical  endurance.  ... 

'But  what  is  to  become  of  our  equilibrium?'  says  an 
honorable  friend  from  South  Carolina.  '  What  security  are 
the  Southern  States  to  have  against  the  growing  preponder- 
ance of  Northern  power  ? '  Mr.  Chairman,  half  the  troubles 
which  have  convulsed  the  old  world  for  two  centuries  past, 
have  grown  out  of  an  imagined  necessity  of  preserving  the 
balance  of  power,  or  maintaining  what  is  now  denominated 
a  sectional  equilibrium.  And  so  it  will  be  here.  The  very 
idea  of  this  equilibrium  is  founded  on  views  of  sectional 
jealousy,  sectional  fear,  sectional  hostility  and  hate.  It  pre- 
supposes an  encroaching  and  oppressive  spirit  on  one  side  or 
the  other,  but  no  such  state  of  things  exists.  Nothing,  cer- 
tainly, can  be  more  unfounded  than  the  idea  that  the  North 
has  any  real  hostility  to  the  South,  or  that  Northern  men,  as 
a  class,  are  desirous  of  injuring,  or  even  of  irritating,  their 
Southern  brethren.  They  know  that  the  interests  of  all 
parts  of  the  country  are  bound  up  together  in  the  same 
bundle  of  life  or  death,  for  the  same  good  or  evil  destiny. 


122  A  MEMOIR  OF 

They  desire  —  from  a  mere  selfish  interest  of  their  own,  if 
you  will  have  it  so  —  the  prosperity  and  welfare  of  the 
Southern  States,  and  rejoice  at  every  indication  of  their 
increasing  wealth  and  power.  They  believe,  indeed,  that 
the  worst  enemy  of  these  States  is  that  which  they  cherish 
so  jealously  and  so  passionately  within  their  own  bosom. 
They  believe  slavery  to  have  originated  in  a  monstrous 
wrong.  They  believe  its  continuance  to  be  a  great  evil. 
They  are  undoubtedly  of  opinion  that  in  this  day  of  civiliza- 
tion and  Christianity,  it  would  well  become  those  who  are 
responsible  for  its  continuance,  to  be  looking  about  at  least 
for  some  prospective  and  gradual  system,  by  which  at  some 
far  distant,  if  not  at  some  earlier  day,  it  may  be  brought  to 
an  end.  They  are  ready,  as  I  believe,  to  bear  their  share 
of  the  cost  and  sacrifice  of  any  such  system.  But  they  know 
that  they  themselves  have  no  power  over  the  subject.  They 
acknowledge  that,  so  far  as  slavery  in  the  States  is  con- 
cerned, they  possess  no  constitutional  right  to  interfere  with 
it  in  any  way  whatever.  .  .  .  But,  Mr.  Chairman,  this  idea 
that  a  free  State  is  never  to  be  admitted  to  the  Union  without 
a  slave  State  to  match  it,  is,  in  my  judgment,  as  impracticable 
as  it  is  unjustifiable.  .  .  .  Sir,  you  did  not  wait  for  a  free  State 
to  come  in  hand  in  hand  with  Texas.  You  regarded  no  prin- 
ciples of  equilibrium  or  uniformity  on  that  occasion.  You 
brought  her  in  to  disturb  the  equilibrium  then  existing,  and 
to  secure  for  the  South  a  preponderance  in  at  least  one 
branch  of  the  Government.  And  with  this  example  in  our 
immediate  view,  the  North,  the  free  States,  cannot  but  feel 
aggrieved  if  the  admission  of  California  is  to  be  made  in  any 
degree  dependent  upon  considerations  of  this  sort.  .  .  . 

And  now,  turning  from  California,  what  remains?  New 
Mexico  and  Utah.  And  what  are  we  to  do  with  them? 
Nothing,  nothing,  I  reply,  which  shall  endanger  the  harmony 
and  domestic  peace  of  these  United  States.  Undoubtedly 
my  own  honest  impulse  and  earnest  disposition  would  be  to 
organize  territorial  governments  over  both  of  them,  and  to 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  123 

ingraft  upon  those  governments  the  principles  of  the  ordi- 
nance of  1787.  If  I  were  consulting  only  my  own  feelings,  or 
what  I  believe  to  be  the  wishes  and  views  of  the  people  of 
New  England,  this  would  be  my  unhesitating  course,  though 
I  am  under  the  impression  that  the  laws  of  Mexico  abolishing 
slavery  are  still  in  force  in  New  Mexico.  But,  sir,  I  am  not 
for  overturning  the  government  of  my  countiy,  or  for  running 
any  risk  of  so  disastrous  a  result,  in  order  to  accomplish  this 
object  in  the  precise  mode  which  would  be  most  satisfactory 
to  myself.  Nor  would  I  press  such  a  course  pertinaciously 
upon  Congress;  even  although  the  consequences  should  be 
nothing  more  serious  than  to  plant  a  sting  in  the  bosoms  of  the 
people  of  the  South,  or  to  leave  an  impression  in  their  minds 
that  they  had  been  wronged  and  humiliated.  What,  then,  am 
I  ready  to  do  ?  Sir,  I  have  already  expressed  my  intention 
to  stand  by  the  President's  plan  on  this  subject,  and  nothing 
has  since  occurred  to  change  that  intention.  I  have  heard 
this  plan  stigmatized  as  weak  and  contemptible ;  but  I  believe 
it  to  be  wise  and  patriotic,  and  one  which,  whether  it  succeeds 
or  fails,  will  have  entitled  the  President  to  the  unmingled 
gratitude  and  respect  of  the  American  people.  It  is,  in  my 
judgment,  the  only  plan  which  gives  a  triumph  to  neither 
side  of  this  controversy,  and  to  neither  section  of  the  Union, 
and  which  thus  leaves  no  just  pretence  for  the  formation  of 
geographical  parties.  It  is  a  middle  ground,  on  which  both 
sides  can  meet  without  the  abandonment  of  any  principle,  or 
the  sacrifice  of  any  point  of  honor,  and  I  can  truly  say  that 
I  agree  to  it  in  a  spirit  of  conciliation  and  concession,  re- 
garding it  as  a  compromise  worthy  of  a  Southern  President 
to  offer,  and  worthy  of  both  the  Southern  and  the  Northern 
people  to  accept.  ... 

Most  gladly  would  I  have  found  myself  agreeing  more 
entirely  with  some  of  the  friends  whom  I  see  around  me,  and 
with  more  than  one  of  those  elsewhere,  with  whom  I  have 
always  been  proud  to  be  associated,  and  whose  lead,  on  almost 
all  occasions,  I  have  rejoiced  to  follow.  ...  I  see,  Mr.  Chair- 


124  A  MEMOIR   OF 

man,  in  the  temtorial  possessions  of  this  Union,  the  seats  of 
new  states,  the  cradles  of  new  commonwealths,  the  nurseries, 
it  may  be,  of  new  Republican  empires.  I  see  in  them  the 
future  abodes  of  our  brethren,  our  children,  and  our  children's 
children,  for  a  thousand  generations.  I  see  growing  up  within 
their  borders  institutions  upon  which  the  character  and  con- 
dition of  a  vast  multitude  of  the  American  family,  and  of  the 
human  race,  in  all  time  to  come,  are  to  depend.  I  feel  that, 
for  the  original  shaping  and  moulding  of  these  institutions, 
you  and  I,  and  each  one  of  us  who  occupy  these  seats,  are 
in  part  responsible.  And  I  look  back  instinctively  to  the  day, 
now  more  than  two  hundred  years  ago,  when  the  forefathers 
of  New  England  were  planting  their  little  colony  upon  that 
rock-bound  shore,  —  to  a  day  when  slavery  existed  nowhere 
upon  the  American  continent,  and  before  that  first  Dutch  ship, 
'  built  in  the  eclipse  and  rigged  with  curses  dark,'  had  made 
its  way  to  Jamestown,  with  a  cargo  of  human  beings  in  bond- 
age! I  reflect  how  much  our  fathers  would  have  exulted, 
could  they  have  arrested  the  progress  of  that  ill-starred 
vessel,  and  of  all  others  of  kindred  employment.  I  remember 
how  earnestly  the  patriots  of  Virginia  and  South  Carolina 
again  and  again  pleaded  and  protested  against  the  policy  of 
Great  Britain  in  forcing  slaves  upon  them  against  their  Avill. 
I  recall  the  original  language  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence, as  first  drafted  by  Thomas  Jefferson,  assigning  it 
as  one  of  the  moving  causes  for  throwing  off  our  allegiance 
to  the  British  monarch,  that,  '  determined  to  keep  open  a 
market  where  men  should  be  bought  and  sold,  he  had  prosti- 
tuted his  negative  for  suppressing  every  legislative  attempt 
to  prohibit  or  to  restrain  this  execrable  commerce.'  I  remem- 
ber,  too,  that  whatever  material  advantages  may  have  since 
been  derived  from  slave  labor,  in  the  cultivation  of  a  crop 
which  was  then  unknown  to  our  country,  the  moral  character 
and  social  influences  of  the  institution  are  still  precisely  what 
they  were  described  to  be,  by  those  who  understood  them 
best,  in  the  earlier  days  of  the  Republic.     And  I  see,  too,  as 


EGBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  125 

no  man  can  help  seeing,  that  ahnost  all  the  internal  dangers 
and  domestic  dissensions  which  cast  a  doubt,  or  a  shadow  of 
doubt,  upon  the  perpetuity  of  the  Union,  have  been  and  still 
are,  the  direct  or  indirect  consequences  of  the  existence  of 
this  institution.  And  thus  seeing,  thus  remembering,  thus 
reflecting,  how  can  I  do  otherwise  than  resolve  that  it  shall 
be  by  no  vote  of  mine  that  slavery  shall  be  established  in  any 
territory  where  it  does  not  already  exist  ?  ^ 

I  here  resume  my  extracts  from  Mr.  Winthrop's 
notes  :  — 

Ashmun  and  other  confidential  friends  of  Webster  ex- 
pressed themselves  as  entirely  satisfied  with  the  ground 
I  had  taken.  Choate  sent  me  word  he  considered  it  an 
admirable  juste  milieu  between  the  7th  of  March  speech  and 
the   rhapsodies   of    Horace   Mann.     On    the  other   hand,   I 

learned  that had  positively  asserted  that  Webster  had 

told  him  in  Boston  that  he  should  not  speak  to  Mr.  Winthrop 
again.  To  test  this,  on  Webster's  return  (for  he  was  absent 
when  I  spoke)  I  accosted  him  when  we  first  met,  at  James 
G.  King's.  He  was  polite,  but  frigid,  and  evidently  out  of 
humor  that  evening,  for  to  poor  Daniel  P.  King  his  manner 
was  quite  savage.  Just  after  this,  Hiram  Ketchum,  a  devoted 
friend  of  Webster,  wrote  to  me  for  three  hundred  copies  of 
the  speech  to  distribute  in  New  York,  telling  me  he  had 
caused  passages  from  it  to  be  inserted  in  many  newspapers. 
In  thanking  him,  I  expressed  regret  that  D.  W.  had  not 
shared  his  complimentary  opinion  of  it.  Ketchum  replied, 
'Give  him  time.     I  am  writing  what  I  think.'     I  imagine 

^  In  the  second  volume  of  the  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power, 
Henry  Wilson  describes  this  speech  (to  which  he  assigns  a  wrong  date) 
as  "  very  able  and  adroit,  an  attempt  to  reconcile  his  former  votes  in 
favor  of  the  Wilmot  Proviso  with  the  new  policy  and  new  departure  he 
was  about  to  adopt."  Whether  this  was  a  fair  account  of  it,  there  may 
be  two  opinions.  It  will  be  found  in  full,  with  earlier  Congressional 
speeches,  in  the  first  volume  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  Addresses. 


126  A  MEMOIR   OF 

Webster  obtained  bis  first  impression  without  having  read 
what  I  had  really  said,  as  shortly  after  he  was  cordial  as  ever, 
and  I  perceived  the  breach  was  healed.  Fillmore  was  good 
enough  to  say  he  thought  it  the  best  speech  made  in  the 
House  during  the  session.  Per  contra^  Cass  attacked  me  in 
the  Senate  and  said  (so  I  am  assured)  that  my  flattery  of  the 
President  was  '  sickening,'  but  he  much  softened  this  in  the 
Globe  and  even  paid  me  a  compliment.  Toombs,  too,  made 
a  premeditated  and  concerted  onslaught  upon  me,  which  he 
greatly  changed  in  the  Globe,  leaving  me  less  ground  for 
a  reply,  had  I  cared  to  make  one.  Some  one  mailed  me  a 
copy  of  this  speech,  published  in  Ohio  without  my  knowl- 
edge.    I  thought  of  sending  it  to  Giddings. 

Partly  owing  to  a  short-sightedness  which  often  pre- 
vented him  from  recognizing  persons  with  whom  he 
was  but  slightly  acquainted,  and  partly  to  a  certain 
native  hauteur,  Mr.  Winthrop  was,  as  a  rule,  no  favorite 
with  reporters,  but  I  find  in  a  local  paper  the  following 
description  of  a  reception  given  by  him  on  the  4tli  of 
July,  1850 :  — 

"  Mr.  Winthrop's  brilliant  reception  on  the  evening  of  the 
4th  was  such  a  gathering  as  Faneuil  Hall  would  have  ap- 
proved on  this  anniversary.  It  was  a  purely  American  party, 
the  patriotism  and  good  taste  of  the  host  having  in  his  invi- 
tations to  his  numerous  guests  discarded  all  distinction  of 
party  or  locality.  Governor  McDowell  of  Virginia  was 
among  the  first  who  entered ;  so  the  Bay  State  and  the  old 
Dominion  stood  hand-in-hand  as  they  did  in  the  persons  of 
John  Adams  and  Thomas  Jefferson  in  1776.  At  supper  Mr. 
Winthrop  had  on  his  left  Mr.  Cobb,  his  successful  competitor 
for  the  Speakership,  with  Vice-President  Fillmore  on  his 
right.  Near  by  were  Benton  and  Foote,  Webster  and  Horace 
Mann,  the  members  elect  from  California,  with  Clingman  and 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  127 

Venable,  who  are  striving  to  keep  them  out,  and  members  of 
the  Cabinet  side  by  side  with  those  who  are  ready  to  im- 
peach them ;  but  all  in  genial  companionship.  Strange 
antagonisms  were  thus  blended  under  the  influence  of  old 
associations,  and  the  memory  of  the  fathers  appeased  for  the 
moment  the  animosities  of  their  sons.  The  occasion  was 
altogether  one  of  the  most  agreeable  I  have  witnessed  in 
Washington,  but  there  was  one  feature  which  gave  it  a  tinge 
of  a  different  character.  It  was  understood  to  be  a  sort  of 
farewell  gathering,  in  view  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  approaching 
retirement  from  Congress,  a  course  which,  I  am  told,  he  is 
fully  resolved  upon.  Such  a  man,  it  is  true,  cannot  long 
remain  in  retirement  while  public  virtue  and  statesmanlike 
accomplishments  are  regarded  as  a  passport  to  the  public 
service.  But  Washington  society  will  miss  the  elegant 
hospitality  so  liberally  exercised  by  Mr.  Winthrop,  and  they 
will  miss  even  more  the  presence  of  a  statesman  whose 
character  is  formed  upon  the  model  of  those  who  filled  the 
highest  official  station  in  the  earlier  and  purer  days  of  the 
Republic." 

Five  days  later  came  a  thunder-clap,  the  death  of 
President  Taylor  after  a  short  illness,  —  a  profound 
grief  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  and  an  irreparable  misfortune, 
as  he  thought,  to  the  country.  In  his  remarks  on  the 
subject  in  the  House  (July  10,  1850),  he  said  :  — 

There  are  those  of  us,  I  need  not  say,  who  had  looked  to 
him  with  affection  and  reverence  as  our  chosen  leader  and 
guide  in  the  difficulties  and  perplexities  by  which  we  are 
surrounded.  There  are  those  of  us  who  had  relied  confi- 
dently on  him,  as  upon  no  other  man,  to  uphold  the  Constitu- 
tion and  maintain  the  Union  of  the  country  in  that  future 
upon  which  '  shadows,  clouds,  and  darkness '  may  well  be 
said  to  rest.  And  as  we  now  behold  him,  borne  away  by  the 
hand  of   God  from  our  sight,  we   can  hardly  repress   the 


128  A  MEMOIR   OF 

exclamation  wliicli  was  applied  to  the  departing  prophet  of 
old,  'My  father,  my  father,  the  chariot  of  Israel,  and  the 
horsemen  thereof.'  .  .  . 

I  hazard  nothing,  sir,  in  saying  that  the  roll  of  our  Chief 
Magistrates,  since  1789,  illustrious  as  it  is,  presents  the  name 
of  no  man  who  has  enjoyed  a  higher  reputation  with  his  con- 
temporaries, or  who  will  enjoy  a  higher  reputation  with 
posterity,  than  Zacliary  Taylor,  for  some  of  the  best  and 
noblest  qualities  which  adorn  our  nature.  His  indomitable 
courage,  his  unimpeachable  honesty,  his  Spartan  simplicity 
and  sagacity,  his  frankness,  kindness,  moderation,  and  mag- 
nanimity, his  fidelity  to  his  friends,  his  generosity  and  hu- 
manity to  his  enemies,  the  purity  of  his  private  life,  the 
patriotism  of  his  public  principles,  will  never  cease  to  be 
cherished  in  the  grateful  remembrance  of  all  just  men  and 
all  true-hearted  Americans.  As  a  soldier  and  a  general,  his 
fame  is  associated  with  some  of  the  proudest  and  most  thrill- 
ing scenes  of  our  military  history.  As  a  civilian  and  states- 
man, during  the  brief  period  in  which  he  has  been  permitted 
to  enjoy  the  transcendent  honors  which  a  grateful  country 
had  awarded  him,  he  has  given  proof  of  a  devotion  to  duty, 
of  an  attachment  to  the  Constitution  and  the  Union,  of  a 
patriotic  determination  to  maintain  the  peace  of  the  country, 
which  no  trials  or  temptations  could  shake.  He  has  borne 
his  faculties  meekly,  but  firmly.  He  has  been  '  clear  in  his 
great  ofiice.'  He  has  known  no  local  partialities  or  prejudices, 
but  has  proved  himself  capable  of  embracing  his  whole 
country  in  the  comprehensive  affections  and  regards  of  a 
large  and  generous  heart. 

On  the  14th  of  July  Mr.  Wintlirop,  who  had  been 
both  a  pall-bearer  of  the  deceased  President  and  Chair- 
man of  the  Committee  of  the  House  which  escorted 
his  successor  to  take  the  oath,  wrote  his  friend  Clifford 
as  follows :  — 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  129 

The  funeral  was  impressive.  '  Old  Whitey '  pressed  close 
to  the  coffin,  as  if  he  knew  his  master  was  there,  reminding 
me  of  Vernet's  Dead  Trumpeter.  All  else  was  cold  and 
formal.  Scott,  his  great  military  rival,  if  not  enemy,  at  the 
head  of  the  escort ;  Cass,  Clay,  Webster,  and  Benton,  among 
the  pall-bearers,  —  gave,  certainly,  no  impression  of  grief 
at  his  loss ;  Truman  Smith,  Vinton,  Joe  Gales,  and  I  did 
most  of  the  mourning,  I  fancy,  in  that  part  of  the  procession. 
For  myself,  it  requires  all  my  faith  in  an  overruling  Provi- 
dence to  prevent  me  from  regarding  the  loss  as  irreparable 
and  fatal.  In  any  strife  which  may  await  us,  his  name  was 
worth  to  us  an  army  with  banners.  Another  week,  too, 
would  have  brought  from  him  a  manifesto,  which  would  have 
done  more  to  bring  things  to  a  crisis,  and  ultimately  settle 
them,  than  anything  which  could  have  been  done.  But  the 
past  is  beyond  recall.  What  of  the  future  ?  Fillmore  is  an 
amiable,  excellent,  conscientious  fellow.  What  he  will  do 
remains  to  be  seen.  Clay  and  Webster  have  been  closeted 
with  him,  and  he  sent  me  a  message  by  a  New  York  friend 
that  he  would  like  to  see  me.  I  called,  but  did  not  find  him. 
If  he  really  wishes  to  see  me,  he  will  send  again.  Clay 
presses  Webster  for  Secretary  of  State,  and  there  is  a  rumor 
that  he  recommends  Toomhs  for  Secretary  of  War.  If  this 
latter  nomination  be  made,  my  course  is  clear.  '  What  fel- 
lowship hath  light  with  darkness  ?  Or  what  concord  a 
Christian  with  Belial  ? '  As  to  Webster's  nomination,  I  see 
that  it  will  jeopard  the  Whig  party  in  the  Free  States,  and 
indicate  a  policy  on  Fillmore's  part  which  I  cannot  altogether 
approve.  Still  I  shall  not  oppose  it,  or  say  anything  against 
it.  The  times  are  out  of  joint,  and  it  needs  a  strong  man  to 
carry  on  the  Government.  If  Fillmore  takes  Webster,  we 
must  support  him  as  well  as  we  can.  I  am  aware  that  my 
own  name  is  mentioned  for  the  State  Department,  but  I  do 
not  think  anything  would  tempt  me  to  take  it.  Even  if  my 
health  would  stand  it,  what  could  I  do  with  Clay  and 
Webster  in  open,   or   tacit,    opposition?  .  .  .  But    for  the 


130  A  MEMOIR  OF 

odium  of  the  Galphin  claim,  I  should  like  to  have  Fillmore 
go  right  on,  taking  up  the  thread  where  Taylor  dropped  it, 
keeping  the  Cabinet  just  as  it  is.  Some  of  them  are  excellent 
fellows,  Ewing  especially.  Crawford,  however,  has  given  an 
odor  of  unscrupulousness  to  the  whole  concern  which  makes 
it  difficult  to  keep  them. 

The  member  of  the  Massachusetts  delegation  who 
was  on  a  confidential  footing  with  the  new  President 
was  Joseph  Grinnell  of  New  Bedford,  who  was  also 
a  very  intimate  friend  of  Mr.  \yintlirop,  from  whose 
notes  I  here  continue  my  extracts :  — 

Late  in  the  evening  of  July  16  th  Grinnell  came  in  and 
said,  '  Fillmore  is  always  slow  in  making  up  his  mind,  but 
this  time  he  is  in  a  pitiable  state  of  indecision,  there  are  so 
many  doubts  and  difficulties,  and  he  is  so  anxious  to  do  the 
right  thing.  The  offer  of  the  State  Department  lies  between 
you  and  Webster.  Personally  he  would  prefer  you,  but 
Webster  is  strongly  urged.  He  would  like  to  talk  the 
matter  over  with  you,  and  says  he  thinks  he  can  rely  on  you 
for  disinterested  advice.'  I  replied  that  it  would  be  better 
to  make  an  appointment,  which  Grinnell  did  for  the  next 
day.  I  found  Nathan  K.  Hall  and  one  or  two  other  persons 
in  the  President's  parlor,^  and  he  took  me  into  his  dressing- 
room,  where  there  was  but  one  chair,  and  we  sat  together  on 
a  narrow  bed,  in  true  Republican  simplicity.  I  told  him 
I  would  not  waste  time  by  beating  about  the  bush,  that  I 
understood  from  Grinnell  that  he  was  hesitating  whether  to 
offer  the  State  Department  to  Webster  or  to  me,  and  that 
he  would  like  my  frank  opinion  on  the  subject.  He  nodded 
assent.  I  said  that,  after  careful  consideration,  I  had  come 
to  a  very  decided  conclusion  that  Webster  should  have  the 
preference.     As  to  myself,  while  I  did  not  affect  to  doubt 

1  Mr.  Fillmore  had  not  yet  taken  possession  of  the  White  House,  but 
was  at  Willard's  hotel. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  131 

my  own  capacity,  and  had  been  urged  to  take  the  post,  if 
offered,  I  did  not  believe  my  appointment  would  be  a  wise 
one  in  the  existing  condition  of  the  country ;  that  I  was 
obnoxious  to  men  of  extreme  opinions  at  both  ends  of  the 
Union ;  that  some  Southern  Whigs,  who  had  hitherto  stood 
by  me  against  Toombs,  were  disappointed  with  what  I  had 
said  on  the  8th  of  May ;  that  in  my  own  State  I  was  now 
between  three  fires,  —  the  Democracy,  the  Free-Soilers,  and 
certain  Webster  Whigs,  who  blamed  me  for  not  indorsing  the 
7th  of  March  speech  and  who  would  be  furious  if  I  were  pre- 
ferred to  Webster ;  that  I  should  be  willing  to  risk  my 
health  by  remaining  some  years  longer  in  Washington  if 
I  felt  there  was  a  probability  of  my  accomplishing  any  real 
good  at  the  head  of  his  Cabinet,  but  my  feeling  was  just  the 
other  way.  As  to  Webster,  that  he  was  an  intellectual  giant, 
with  a  weight  in  the  country  beside  which  my  own  was 
insignificant ;  that  I  had  not  always  been  able  to  agree  with 
him ;  that  I  had  sometimes  thought  him  influenced  by  jealousy 
or  pique,  but  that  I  believed  him  to  be  at  heart  a  true  patriot, 
whose  recent  course,  much  as  I  regretted  it,  was  dictated  by 
a  sincere  desire  to  save  the  country  from  civil  war ;  that  as 
a  measure  of  mere  party  expediency  I  might  hesitate  to 
recommend  an  appointment  which  would  undoubtedly  shock 
many  Northern  Whigs,  but  in  view  of  the  dangers  and  diffi- 
culties which  surrounded  the  Union,  I  believed  he  would  be 
the  safest  choice.  Fillmore  replied  at  some  length,  saying 
among  other  things  that  a  President  might  well  hesitate  to 
be  overshadowed  in  his  own  Cabinet,  that  Webster  was  not 
easy  to  get  on  with ;  reminding  me  that  when  he  (Fillmore) 
was  Chairman  of  Ways  and  Means  and  Webster  Secretary  of 
State  to  Tyler,  they  had  differed  over  the  Exchequer  bill, 
and  Webster  had  not  spoken  to  him  for  more  than  a  year. 
I  rejoined  that  no  one  was  better  aware  than  myself  of  the 
awful  character  of  Webster's  frowns,  that  I  did  not  contend 
that  he  was  an  ideal  premier^  but  that  I  honestly  believed 
him  to  be,  all  things  considered,  the  wisest  selection  in  the 


132  A  MEMOIR  OF 

existing  crisis.  He  said  he  would  take  a  night  to  think  it 
over,  and  we  then  discussed  some  other  matters.  I  did  not 
consider  it  quite  fair  to  ask  him  point  blank  if  he  intended 
to  adopt  Taylor's  policy  ;  but  he  left  in  my  mind  the  impres- 
sion that  he  approved  it.  When  we  parted  he  said  some 
complimentaiy  things  about  me  which  I  will  not  set  down. 
As  soon  as  I  got  home  I  made  a  point  of  letting  Ashmun 
know  the  substance  of  what  had  taken  place,  in  case  it  should 
reach  Webster's  ears  that  I  had  been  closeted  with  the 
President.  The  next  day,  while  at  my  desk  in  the  House, 
Webster  sent  for  me  to  come  into  the  lobby,  said  he  had 
learned  from  more  than  one  source  the  advice  I  had  given, 
and  had  come  to  thank  me  ;  that  while  he  thought  me  well 
fitted  to  be  Secretary  of  State,  and  hoped  one  day  to  see  me 
in  that  office,  he  was  himself  not  indisposed  to  resume  it,  and 
had  reason  to  believe  it  would  now  be  offered  to  him.  I  re- 
plied that  my  advice  had  been  given  on  public  grounds,  and 
not  as  a  matter  of  private  friendship.  He  rejoined,  with  great 
cordiality,  '  I  am  none  the  less  sensible  of  your  generous  and 
manly  course.'  ^ 

On  the  day  the  nominations  went  to  the  Senate,  Webster 
again  sent  for  me  to  the  lobby.  '  Before  you  and  I  leave  this 
sofa,'  said  he,  '  I  shall  probably  have  been  confirmed.  Now, 
if  there  is  anything  under  the  sun  that  I  can  do  for  you, 
name  it.  Shall  I  write  to  Governor  Briggs  asking  him  to 
appoint  you  as  my  successor  ?  '  I  replied  that  I  had  rather 
not ;  that  though  I  had  fully  expected  to  break  up  my  estab- 

1  The  utterance  of  a  conventional  nolo  episcopari  is  not  confined  to 
English  prelates.  On  the  21st  of  July  (three  days  after  this  conver- 
sation) Mr.  Webster  wrote  Peter  Harvey,  "  I  was  persuaded  to  think  it 
was  my  duty  in  the  present  crisis  to  accept  a  seat  in  the  Cabinet,  but  it 
made  my  heart  ache  to  think  of  it."  Private  Correspondence  of  Daniel 
Webster,  vol.  ii.  p.  378.  On  the  same  day  he  wrote  Franldin  Haven,  "  I 
never  did  anything  more  reluctantly  than  taking  the  office  which  I  have 
taken.  .  .  .  You  will  be  glad  to  know  that  Mr.  Winthrop  acted  in  the 
most  friendly,  open,  and  decided  manner.  He  behaved  like  a  man 
throughout."    Life  of  Daniel  Webster,  by  G.  T.  Curtis,  vol.  ii.  p.  465. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  133 

lishment  in  Washington  at  the  end  of  the  session,  the  honor 
of  succeeding  to  Daniel  Webster's  seat  in  the  Senate  was  too 
great  to  be  put  aside,  but  that,  if  it  came,  it  must  come  un- 
sought; that  my  name  would  obviously  occur  to  Briggs 
without  any  prompting,  but  that  there  were  other  claims, 
and  he  must  have  a  free  hand.  He  rejoined,  '  All  I  can  say 
is  that  if,  while  I  am  at  the  head  of  affairs,  there  should  be 
any  way  in  which,  directly  or  indirectly,  I  can  be  of  service 
to  you,  you  will  have  only  to  say  the  word.'  I  thanked  him 
for  his  friendly  expressions,  but  said  such  a  word  would 
never  be  spoken  by  me.  The  following  Sunday  morning  he 
sat  in  my  pew  at  Dr.  Butler's  church,  as  he  was  often  in  the 
habit  of  doing.  As  we  walked  away  after  service,  he  men- 
tioned that  all  his  letters  stated  that  I  was  to  be  Senator. 
I  replied  that  I  had  at  first  been  pleased  with  the  idea,  but 
now  had  some  misgivings  on  the  subject.  '  How  so  ? '  said 
he.  I  answered  that  if  I  went  to  the  Senate  just  now,  my 
attitude  might  seem  to  him  an  ungracious  one ;  that  I  had  no 
new  speeches  to  make,  that  my  platform  was  laid  down,  and 
I  could  take  no  step  backward;  that,  differing  as  we  did 
about  the  Compromise  measures,  my  votes  might  not  be 
altogether  agreeable  to  him.  He  said,  'To  tell  the  honest 
truth,  I  should  not  be  sorry  if  you  were  called  away  for  a 
fortnight  or  so ;  but,  as  it  is,  we  must  make  the  best  of  it. 
Of  course  you  cannot  change  your  ground.' 

The  next  morning  brought  Mr.  Winthrop  his  com- 
mission. His  promotion  was  greeted  by  a  diversity  of 
appreciation  in  New  England,  and  as  a  perceptible 
degree  of  sameness  is  apt  to  pervade  the  congratula- 
tions of  personal  friends  and  political  supporters,  I 
prefer  to  cull  an  extract  from  a  sprightly  leader  in  the 
Worcester  "  Spy,"  then  the  most  active  Free-Soil  organ 
in  Massachusetts  :  — 

"Robert  C.  Winthrop  will  make  a  fit  successor  to  Daniel 


134  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Webster  in  the  Senate  of  the  United  States ;  and  the  only 
consolation  we  have  in  his  appointment  is  that  he  has  been 
taken  away  from  the  House,  where  there  is  a  bare  chance 
that  his  place  may  be  filled  by  a  better  man,  —  a  worse  they 
will  hardly  be  able  to  get." 


VII. 


When  Mr.  AVinthrop  entered  the  Senate  (July  30, 
1850),  that  body  was  in  the  last  stages  of  the  discus- 
sion of  the  Compromise  measures,  important  votes  oc- 
curring daily,  —  one  of  them  only  an  hour  after  he  had 
taken  his  seat.  He  had  no  new  profession  of  political 
faith  to  make,  but  he  was  soon  drawn  into  the  debate, 
speaking  at  intervals  upon  a  variety  of  questions,  —  in 
particular  upon  the  Texas  Boundary  Bill,  the  Fugitive 
Slave  Bill,  and  the  Bill  for  abolishing  the  Slave  Trade  in 
the  District  of  Columbia.  These  speeches,  though  not 
infrequent,  were  comparatively  short,  and  they  contain 
no  passages  which  it  is  essential  to  cite  in  this  memoir.-^ 
I  prefer  therefore  to  quote  extracts  from  a  few  of  his 
private  letters  :  — 

[Aug.  1,  1850.]  The  Compromise  is  dead,  and  I  '  saw  it 
die.'  I  can't  say  that  I  did  much  with  '  my  little  bow  and 
arrow,'  but  I  made  one  motion  which  had  more  import  than 
it  may  seem.  It  was  the  only  way  of  getting  a  clean  vote  in 
favor  of  the  California  Bill,  and  a  clean  vote  against  the  Utah 
Bill.  Failing  to  strike  out  Utah  from  California,  the  only 
way  was  to  strike  out  California  from  Utah.  So  said  Benton, 
Smith,  Phelps,  Clarke,  and  other  old  stagers  at  the  outset; 

^  They  are  all  to  be  found  in  the  "  Congressional  Globe,"  some  of  them 
in  Mr.  Winthrop's  volumes.  One  is  described  by  Henry  Wilson  as  "  brief, 
but  very  cogent."    See  "  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power,"  vol.  ii.  p.  294. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  135 

and  so  said  Ewing,  Davis,  Seward,  Baldwin,  and  your  humble 
servant,  on  a  reconsideration.  They  put  it  upon  me  to  father 
the  motion,  but  the  sponsors  must  take  their  share  of  the 
responsibility.  It  was  the  only  mode  by  which  the  bill  could 
be  reduced  to  its  simple  elements,  and  by  which  the  great 
principle  of  unmixed  legislation  could  be  vindicated. 

[Aug.  11.]  As  Clay  had  publicly  laid  the  whole  blame 
of  the  defeat  of  the  Compromise  on  Pearce,^  the  latter  has 
been  hard  at  work  on  a  settlement  of  the  Boundary  question, 
and  has  consulted  Senators  both  from  Texas  and  New  Eng- 
land (myself  included)  in  the  hope  of  reconciling  their  con- 
flicting views.  His  measure  does  not  wholly  satisfy  me,  and 
I  anticipate  not  a  few  revilings  from  Massachusetts  extrem- 
ists for  my  support  of  it.  But  I  trust  the  Whig  party  proper 
will  be  able  to  stand  what  Taylor  suggested,  Fillmore  pro- 
posed, Webster  advised,  and  John  Davis  and  I  voted  for. 
We  voted  in  company  with  Clarke  and  Greene  of  Rhode 
Island,  Truman  Smith  of  Connecticut,  Phelps  of  Vermont, 
and  Cooper  of  Pennsylvania.  If  other  Free-State  Whigs  would 
have  gone  with  us,  all  would  have  been  easy ;  but  Ewing, 
with  an  election  in  Ohio  before  him,  did  not  like  to  separate 
from  Chase ;  Seward  clung  to  Hale ;  and  Baldwin  and 
Upham  are  rigid  against  the  slightest  concession.  The  bill 
involved  no  principle,  —  it  was  a  mere  question  of  acres  and 
dollars,  —  but  it  was  the  one  thing  needful  for  the  public 
peace.  It  has  taken  away  the  whole  platform  of  the  disorgan- 
izers.  Settle  this  Texan  boundary,  run  the  New-Mexican 
line,  and,  whatever  happens,  the  Union  is  safe.  Texas  itself 
becomes  a  guaranty  for  this,  for  her  sympathies  are  all  with 
the  conservative  South,  and  she  has  had  no  fellowship  with 
the  nullifiers  except  upon  the  question  of  her  territorial  rights. 
By  this  bill  we  have  saved  for  free  soil  much  that  would  have 
been  doomed  to  slavery,  and  we  can  now  wait  patiently  until 
New  Mexico  shall  be  admitted  as  a  State.     Still  it  was  a  pill 

^  James  A.  Pearce,  Senator  from  Maryland,  a  particular  friend  of  the 
writer. 


136  A  MEMOIR  OF 

to  swallow,  and  Davis  and  I  felt  bound  to  complain  both  of 
the  boundaries  and  the  homes,  and  to  attempt  some  alteration. 
Yet,  on  the  whole,  my  judgment  approves.  Grinnell  and 
Ashmun  are  strong  for  it ;  and,  I  think,  Rockwell  and  Dun- 
can. The  Southern  Ultras  will  leave  no  stone  unturned 
to  defeat  it.  .  .  .  We  shall  admit  California  (D.  V.)  on 
Monday. 

[Aug.  25.]  The  Fugitive  Bill,  with  all  its  objectionable 
featui-es,  has  passed  to  be  engrossed.  It  is  neither  Webster's 
bill  nor  Clay's,  but  James  M.  Mason's,  of  which,  however,  my 
illustrious  predecessor  said  that  he  intended  to  support  it, 
with  all  its  provisions,  to  the  full  extent.  Not  so  said  I; 
and,  after  trying  in  vain  for  Trial  by  Jury,  and  Habeas  Corpus 
and  Protection  for  Free  Colored  Seamen,  I  voted  against  it. 
The  South,  as  I  think,  has  overreached  itself  in  pressing  this 
hill.  They  will  get  few  runaways  under  it,  while  it  will  be 
a  constant  source  of  irritation  and  inflammation  ;  besides-  giv- 
ing a  fresh  base  to  the  Free-Soil  party.  .  .  .  Webster  was  so 
much  gratified  by  Davis's  and  my  support  of  Pearce's  Boun- 
dary Bill,  that  he  called  on  Gov.  D.  (from  whom,  as  you 
know,  he  has  been  for  some  time  alienated),  and  then  insisted 
that  we  should  both  dine  with  him.  D.  was  prevented  by  a 
family  affliction,  but  I  went,  finding  the  entire  Cabinet,  includ- 
ing Scott,  who  is  acting  Secretary  of  War,  and  who  had  pre- 
viously been  to  see  me  to  urge  going  for  Pearce's  bill. 

[Sept.  15.]  Davis  and  I  took  some  risk  in  voting  against 
Seward's  indiscreet  amendment  to  the  Bill  for  abolishing  the 
Slave  Trade  in  the  District.  But  wisdom  is  justified  of  her 
children,  and  our  course  is  crowned  by  the  passage  of  the  bill 
yesterday.  My  personal  relations  with  Seward  are  pleasant, 
but  I  fear  he  is  bent  on  mischief  and  designs  to  get  up  issues 
for  placing  other  people  in  a  false  position.  His  organ 
(Weed)  attacked  me  grossly  on  the  strength  of  an  inaccurate 
telegraphic  report  of  what  I  said.  The  truth  is,  Seward  is  at 
heart  anti-Fillmore  and  anti-Administration,  and,  unless  I  am 
greatly  mistaken,  he  will  one  day  go  over  to  the  Free  Soilers. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  137 

Speaking  of  telegraphic  blunders,  did  you  see  a  very  amusing 
one  about  me  ?  '  Senator  Downs  of  Louisiana  made  a  speech 
denunciatory  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  violent  manner^  loth  in  matter 
and  in  gesticulation.'*  This  was  intended  to  read  '  Senator 
Downs  of  Louisiana  made  a  speech  denunciatory  of  Mr.  Win- 
throp,  violent  both  in  matter  and  gesticulation.'  On  the 
strength  of  this  mistake,  some  newspaper-mouser  of  the  future 
in  the  guise  of  a  historian  may  represent  me  to  have  been  a 
sort  of  swashbuckler ! 

Of  the  various  exciting  topics  then  in  controversy 
between  the  two  sections  of  the  Union,  —  particularly 
between  the  inhabitants  of  the  Northern  and  Southern 
seaboards,  —  the  most  inflammatory  was  the  question  of 
the  proper  treatment  of  free  colored  seamen  in  Southern 
ports.  On  the  one  hand,  the  South  honestly  believed 
these  seamen  often  to  be  abolition  emissaries,  the  possible 
instigators  of  slave  insurrections,  who,  as  a  measure  of 
precaution,  were  to  be  subjected  to  stringent  laws; 
while,  on  the  other  hand,  the  sensibilities  of  the  North 
were  continually  outraged  by  the  severity  of  such  laws, 
and  the  hardships  resulting  from  them  to  innocent  and 
inoffensive  persons.  Mr.  Winthrop  had  long  been 
familiar  with  this  subject,  having  treated  it  fully  in  a 
report  made  by  him  to  the  House  on  behalf  of  the  Com- 
mittee on  Commerce,  in  1843,  and  it  was  a  matter  in 
which  the  shipowners  of  Boston  were  deeply  interested. 
It  was,  however,  far  from  his  intention  to  signalize  the 
first  month  of  his  Senatorial  career  by  stirring  up  any 
discussion  of  these  obnoxious  laws ;  but  it  so  happened 
that  to  Mr.  Clay's  Bill  for  the  Abolition  of  the  Slave 
Trade  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  Senator  Pratt  of  Mary- 
land had  proposed  an  amendment  dealing  with  the  free 


138  A  MEMOIR   OF 

colored  population  of  the  District  in  a  manner  which 
Mr.  Winthrop  considered  unwarrantable  and  unjust. 
In  condemning  and  opposing  the  Pratt  amendment,  he 
made  a  passing  allusion  to  the  abuses  arising  from  some 
of  the  police  regulations  of  Southern  States  ;  and  when 
Senator  Butler  of  South  Carolina  had  objected  to  the 
word  "  abuses,"  contending  that  the  regulations  com- 
plained of  were  practically  measures  of  self-preserva- 
tion, Mr.  Winthrop  felt  obliged  to  produce  evidence. 
Thereupon  an  angry  debate  sprang  up,  stretching  over 
two  days  (Sept.  11-12,  1850),  Senators  Berrien  of 
Georgia,  Davis  of  Mississippi,  Downs  and  Soule  of 
Louisiana,  all  warmly  sustaining  Butler,  accusing  Mr. 
Winthrop  of  exaggeration,  and  subjecting  him  to  a 
running  fire  of  interruption  and  criticism.  He  was 
forced  to  speak  half  a  dozen  times,  at  some  length  and 
with  much  animation  ;  but  as  Butler  and  Berrien  were 
old  friends,  and  he  had  latterly  seen  something  of  Jef- 
ferson Davis  (who  was  General  Taylor's  son-in-law),  he 
strove  to  give  no  cause  of  offence,  except  in  so  far  as  it 
was  necessary  to  vindicate  his  statements.  To  Senator 
Soule,  indeed,  he  was  magnanimous.  The  latter  had 
denied  the  existence  of  a  Louisiana  law  which  had  been 
cited,  and  roundly  intimated  that  Mr.  Winthrop  had 
been  imposed  upon.  As  Soule  was  a  leader  of  the 
New  Orleans  bar,  this  assertion  was  for  the  moment 
accepted  as  conclusive,  until  a  few  days  later  Mr. 
Winthrop  procured  a  printed  copy  of  the  statute  to 
which  he  had  alluded.  Instead,  however,  of  producing 
it  on  the  floor  and  making  a  scene,  he  showed  it 
privately  to  Soule,  suggesting  that  he  should  choose  his 
own  form  of  retraction  in  the  Senate,  which  he  did, 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  139 

frankly  admitting  that  his  memory  had  betrayed  him. 
After  the  second  day's  debate  was  over,  Mr.  Clay  took 
occasion  to  say  to  Mr.  Winthrop  that  he  felt  that  the 
latter  had  been  treated  with  unusual  and  unnecessary 
harshness,  but  that  it  was  attributable  to  the  excited 
state  of  Southern  feeling.  "  You  have  little  reason  to 
complain,"  he  added;  "you  held  your  own  against 
great  odds."  ^  Horace  Mann  evidently  preferred  a 
more  drastic  method  of  treating  political  opponents. 
In  one  of  his  private  letters  from  Washington,  pub- 
lished after  his  death  and  dated  Sept.  15,  1850,  he 
says : — 

"  There  has  been  a  very  sharp  debate  in  the  Senate,  in  which 
the  Southern  men  rode  and  overrode  Mr.  Winthrop,  and 
hunted  up  all  the  ugly  things  they  could  say  about  Massa- 
chusetts and  pitched  them  at  him.  I  do  not  think  Mr.  Win- 
throp has  sustained  himself  very  well.  He  ought  to  have 
carried  the  war  into  Africa,  or,  at  least,  to  have  repelled  the 
intruders  from  his  own  territory.  When  we  speak  of  the 
South  as  the7j  are^  the  first  thing  they  do  is  to  ransack  our 
old  history  and  quote  whatever  they  can  find,  either  against 
the  law  of  toleration  as  we  now  consider  it,  or  the  duties  of 
humanity  as  a  higher  civilization  exemplifies  and  expounds 
them.     They  have   never  yet  been   properly  answered.     If 

^  Not  long  after,  Mr.  Winthrop  printed  and  circulated  a  pamphlet 
containing,  not  merely  this  debate,  but  one  which  occurred  a  few  daj'S 
earlier,  bearing  upon  the  same  subject,  together  with  some  subsequent 
explanations  and  a  variety  of  evidence,  —  the  whole  extracted  from  the 
"  Congressional  Globe,"  and  entitled  "  Proceedings  of  the  United  States 
Senate  on  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  the  Abolition  of  the  Slave  Trade  in 
the  District  of  Columbia,  and  the  Imprisonment  of  Free  Colored  Seamen 
in  the  Southern  Ports  ;  with  the  Speeches  of  Senators  Davis,  Winthrop, 
and  others."  As  this  pamphlet  comprised  nearly  seventy  pages  of  small 
type,  he  did  not  include  it  in  his  published  works,  but  it  is  to  be  found  in 
most  large  libraries. 


140  A  MEMOIR  OF 

some  such  man  as  Sumner  was  in  the  seat,  he  would  turn 
the  tables  on  them."  ^ 

From  Boston,  however,  Mr.  Winthrop  received  letters 
of  approval  from  men  of  different  shades  of  opinion. 
Edward  Everett,  for  instance,  wrote  :  — 

"  I  cannot  forbear  writing  you  a  line  to  thank  you  for  your 
manly  and  well-sustained  stand  on  the  subject  of  the  code 
noir  of  the  Southern  States.  Nothing  could  have  been  done 
more  handsomely,  effectively,  or  in  better  taste.  Although 
certain  Senators  may  affect  to  treat  your  statements  with  dis- 
dain, and  meet  them  with  contumely,  they  will  in  their 
hearts  respect  you  for  the  boldness  and  freedom  with  which 
you  have  assailed  the  abuses  of  their  system." 

Richard  H.  Dana,  Jr.,  wrote  :  — 

"  Permit  me  to  congratulate  you  upon  the  manner  in  which 
you  conducted  this  debate.  The  style  in  which  it  was  done 
is  commended  by  all.  Massachusetts  is  with  you  on  this 
point,  and  in  all  your  late  votes,  I  do  not  doubt ;  but  Boston 
is  against  you.  I  do  not  wish  to  disparage  my  own  city,  but 
the  composition  of  its  elements  is  peculiar.  It  is  not  the 
Boston  of  1776  or  1820."  2 

Anson  Bmiingame  wrote  :  — 

"  [Sept.  19,  1850.]  Permit  me  to  say  that  your  replies  to 
Jefferson  Davis,  Downs,  Sould  and  Co.  were  models  of  dig- 
nified yet  indignant  rebuke,  and  have  awakened  for  you 
countless  sympathies  in  hearts  heretofore  closed  against  you 
politically.  I  am  not  singular  in  this  estimate  of  your  efforts. 
Many  of  the  most  worthy  and  able  men  with  whom  I  have 

^  Life  of  Mann,  p.  230.     This  gratification  was  in  store  for  him. 
2  What  Mr.  Dana  implied  was  that,  at  this  juncture,  the  Democracy 
and  Webster  Whigs  united  could  control  Boston. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  141 

lately  voted  express  themselves  unreservedly  to  the  same 
extent.  I  honestly  think  —  and  I  say  it  frankly  to  you  —  that 
your  recent  bearing  in  the  Senate  has  done  more  to  commend 
you  to  the  people  of  this  State  than  any  other  act  of  your 
stirring  political  life.  We  of  the  North  are,  as  a  general 
thing,  not  so  well  trained  as  Southern  statesmen  for  sudden 
parliamentaiy  encounters ;  but  here  you  met  an  occasion  of 
great  difficulty,  and  met  it  bravely  and  brilliantly,  exhibiting 
both  tact  and  power.  .  .  . 

"  If  you  ever  see  the  '  Republican,'  a  sickly  paper  which  pre- 
tends or  tries  to  speak  for  the  Free-Soil  party,  pray  give  no 
heed  to  its  reckless  statements.  It  is  in  the  hands  of  General 
Wilson,  a  good  enough  man  in  his  proper  place,  but  who  is 
altogether  beyond  his  depth  in  editing  a  newspaper.  He  is, 
or  has  been,  anxious  to  get  up  another  truck  and  dicker. 
We  Whig  Free-Soilers  knocked  that  Democratic  move  in  the 
head  after  considerable  trouble,  and  we  have  not  the  least 
idea  of  being  traded  off  to  the  Democracy  to  gratify  any- 
body's desire  to  go  to  the  United  States  Senate.  Such  men 
as  Samuel  Hoar,  Stephen  C.  Phillips,  Hopkins,  Adams,  Dana, 
etc.,  say  openly  that  if  anything  of  the  kind  is  attempted, 
they  must  beg  leave  to  wash  their  hands  of  it."  ^ 

One  letter  I  give  in  full,  because  the  vrriter  was  per- 
haps the  last  person  in  New  England  from  whom  Mr. 
Winthrop  could  have  anticipated  a  word  of  praise :  — 

West  Roxbury,  Sept.  23,  1850. 
Dear  Sir,  —  I  have  not  been  always  much  of  an  admirer 
of  your  course  in  Congress,  and  have  often  felt  pained  at  the 
thought  that  the  Representative  from  Boston  should  do  as 

^  I  am  obliged  to  quote  this  passage  in  order  to  give  some  idea  of  the 
letters  addressed  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  by  persons  not  of  his  own  way  of  think- 
ing, with  regard  to  the  famous  Massachusetts  Coalition.  I  disclaim,  how- 
ever, any  purpose  of  casting  reflections  upon  General  Wilson,  concerning 
whose  "  depth  "  Mr.  Burlingame  undoubtedly  changed  his  mind  before 
long. 


142  A  MEMOIR  OF 

you  have  done.  But  of  late  your  votes  and  your  speeches  in 
the  Senate  of  the  United  States  have  been  so  just  and  so 
noble,  as  it  seems  to  me,  that  I  feel  impelled  to  write  you 
this  note  —  stranger  as  I  am  to  you  —  to  thank  you  for  the 
honorable  and  manly  stand  you  have  taken  lately  in  the 
Senate.  I  know  some  of  your  friends  (I  mean  your  former 
friends)  will  excuse  it  on  the  score  of  policy  and  defend  you, 
while  they  differ  from  you,  because  they  will  say  the  People 
of  Massachusetts  were  to  be  conciliated  before  they  choose  a 
Senator.  Some  of  your  political  opponents,  I  suppose,  will 
be  of  the  same  opinion.  But  I  can  only  ascribe  your  conduct 
to  such  motives  as  ought  to  animate  a  manly  man,  —  a  desire 
to  do  what  is  absolutely  right.  Allow  me  to  say  to  yourself  — 
what  I  would  rather  say  anywhere  else  —  that  your  conduct 
now  seems  particularly  honorable  and  manly,  when  the 
temptation  to  swerve  from  justice  seems  to  be  so  strong,  and 
when  there  are  such  eminent  examples  of  departure  from  the 
Eternal  Right.  Do  not  give  yourself  the  trouble  to  answer 
this  note,  but  accept  the  hearty  thanks  of 
Your  Obt.  Servt. 

Theo.  Parker. 
Hox.  Robert  C.  Winthrop. 

Congress  adjourned  on  the  30th  of  September,  meet- 
ing again  early  in  December.  Here  follow  a  few  more 
extracts  from  Mr.  Winthrop's  private  letters :  — 

[Oct.  18,  1850.]  I  am  by  no  means  sure  Massachusetts 
Whiggery  will  survive  the  shock  the  passage  of  the  Fugitive 
Bill  has  given  it,  particularly  as  it  is  understood  that  the 
Democrats  and  Free  Soilers  have  at  last  agreed  on  an  equita- 
ble division  of  the  loaves  and  fishes.  How  high-minded  men 
can  have  anything  to  do  with  such  a  bargain  passes  my  com- 
prehension ;  but  then  high-minded  men  are  scarce  in  politics, 
and  as  I  am  to  be  the  principal  loser  by  the  transaction,  I  am 
naturally  open  to  the  suspicion  of  looking  at  it  with  a  jaun- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  143 

diced  eye.^  "With  my  uncertain  health  and  great  dislike  of 
the  Washington  climate,  the  idea  of  a  full  Senatorial  term  of 
six  years  was  never  alluring,  but  I  should  have  preferred  not 
to  be  cut  short  in  my  second  session  by  a  defeat  in  the  Legis- 
lature, as  it  is  now  not  unlikely.  I  am,  as  usual,  between  sev- 
eral fires.  Webster  and  I  are  on  perfectly  good  terms,  but 
some  of  his  peculiar  friends  regard  me  with  a  basilisk  eye, 
and  bitterly  reproach  my  not  having  followed  in  his  foot- 
steps. On  the  other  hand,  the  Free  Soilers  are  in  no  humor 
to  forgive  my  old  opposition  to  them,  nor  my  recent  vote  for 
the  Boundary  Bill.  Webster,  by  the  way,  is  at  Marshfield,  — 
'  the  sick  lion,'  —  with  a  good  many  beasts  flocking  to  his 
den.  I  have  not  seen  him  yet,  but  I  hear  he  is  cross,  an 
infallible  sign  of  convalescence. 

[Nov.  12.]  '  Into  what  pit  thou  seest,  from  what  height 
fallen ! '  The  telegraph  will  have  told  you  the  result.  We 
are  beaten,  horse,  foot,  and  dragoons,  —  or,  in  other  words, 
Governor,  Senate,  and  House,  though  the  latter  is  a  little 
uncertain.  I  feared  it  would  come  to  this.  Taylor's  plat- 
form was  as  far  as  Massachusetts  would  go,  whether  under 
Webster's  lead  or  that  of  anybody  else.  Indeed,  I  am  to 
have  a  vicarious  punishment  and  take  the  fall  which  was 
arranged  for  him.  As  I  had  originally  purposed  quitting 
Washington  next  March,  it  matters  little.  But  I  grieve  for 
the  good  old  cause,  wounded  in  the  house  of  its  friends,  — 
by  what  agencies  and  influences  history  will  pronounce.  I 
grieve  for  the  good  old  Commonwealth,  which  seems  likely 
to  be  the  subject  of  that  sort  of  reform  which  was  practised 
by  certain  daughters  of  antiquity  upon  their  aged  parent. 
You  remember  the  old  story  of  their  cutting  him  to  pieces 
and  boiling  him  in  a  caldron,  to  make  him  young  again. 

1  The  ablest  defence  of  the  Massachusetts  Coalition  is  to  be  found  in 
Henry  Wilson's  "  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power;  "  the  most  eifective 
exposure  of  it  in  an  Address  to  the  People  by  the  Whig  Members  of  the 
Legislature  in  1851,  written  by  Benjamin  R.  Curtis,  afterward  a  Justice 
of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States. 


144  A  MEMOIR   OF 

[Dec.  11.]  For  the  Massachusetts  Legislature  to  do  me 
justice  would  certainly  be  gratifying,  but  I  do  not  think  it 
would  tempt  me  to  stay  here  six  years  longer.  One  thing 
1  should  like,  —  and  that  is,  to  be  rightly  understood  on 
the  vexed  questions  of  the  day.  Never  was  there  a  time 
when  moderate  men  were  more  liable  to  be  misconstrued. 
Some  of  our  own  friends  are  in  an  inflammatory  state  of 
vigilance,  and  even  agitation,  upon  all  these  matters.  They 
must  put  down  everybody  who  differs  from  them,  or  who 
does  not  keep  silence  when  they  cry  'hush.'  In  these 
momentous  times,  they  are  the  most  clamorous  advocates  of 
silence,  the  most  belligerent  champions  of  peace,  and  the  most 
discordant  defenders  of  harmony.  '  Si  vis  flere^  flenditm  est ' 
was  a  maxim  of  Horace  and  Quintilian,  both  for  poets  and 
orators.  If  you  wish  harmony,  you  must  be  harmonious.  If 
you  wish  peace,  you  must  not  yourself  quarrel.  If  you  desire 
to  stop  agitation,  you  must  lay  your  finger  on  your  own 
lips.  This  is  good  philosophy  in  all  ages.  But  certain  of 
our  great  and  small  men  seem  not  to  think  so,  and  are 
sounding  their  rams'  horns  in  every  direction,  ostensibly  to 
keep  the  walls  of  Jericho  standing,  but  in  reality  to  signalize 
their  own  prowess. 

[Dec.  31.]  Webster's  Austrian  manifesto  is,  in  some  re- 
spects, a  grand  paper ;  though  I  think  that  if  Great  Britain 
had  sent  an  agent  to  watch  the  progress  of  South  Carolina 
Nullification,  with  a  view  to  making  a  commercial  treaty  at 
the  earliest  moment,  w^e  should  not  have  shrunk  from 
denouncing  him  as  a  spy.  Clay's  opposition  to  the  extra 
copies  is  the  first  symptom  of  the  revival  of  the  old  rivalry. 
They  are  both  again  bent  on  being  candidates ,  —  not  remem- 
bering that  candidates  are  not  always  Presidents.  Webster's 
New  Englander  was  a  rouser,  and  in  his  best  style  of  after- 
dinner  oratory ;  but  I  should  have  liked  it  better  if,  this 
time,  his  Union  safety-valve  had  been  shut  off.  So  ends 
1850.  Another  hour  will  bring  us  to  a  new  figure  in  the 
units'   place.     Who  can  say  what  is  in  store  for  us  in  the 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  145 

coming  year,  or  whether  its  numerals  shall  be  inscribed  on 
our  official  or  on  our  personal  tombstones?  The  readiness 
is  all. 

[Jan.  12,  1851.]  I  agree  with  you  in  distrusting  the  sincer- 
ity of  Caleb  Gushing,  who  is  probably  only  possuming.  If  I 
had  the  privilege  of  naming  a  Free-Soil  successor,  it  would  bo 
Samuel  Hoar,  who  is  the  most  respectable  man  of  his  party. 
Morton,  or  Mills,  too,  I  could  cheerfully  make  way  for.  Even 
S.  C.  Phillips,  or  Mann,  would  not  nauseate  me.  But,  I 
confess,  my  stomach  revolts  from  Sumner.  At  any  rate, 
whatever  is  done  or  left  undone,  I  hope  the  short-term 
vacancy  will  soon  be  filled.  I  sit  daily,  like  Damocles  at  the 
feast,  with  the  sword  suspended  by  a  hair  above  my  head. 
The  sooner  it  falls,  the  better. 

[Jan.  19.]  The  Baltimore  'Sun'  says,  that  as  my  recent 
votes  are  precisely  what  Sumner's  would  have  been,  the 
substitution  of  Sumner  for  Winthrop  is  not  so  much  to  be 
dreaded !  Webster,  too,  criticises  my  action  in  voting  to 
refer  John  P.  Hale's  petitions  to  the  Judiciary  Committee  ; 
but  my  belief  is  that  by  laying  them  on  the  table  we  should 
only  have  given  rise  to  fruitless  agitation.  .  .  .  B.  R.  Curtis 
has  been  here,  and  dined  with  me,  when  I  strongly  advised 
postponing  the  long-term  vacancy  until  next  winter.  As  our 
Legislature  is  now  constituted,  and  after  the  developments 
of  corruption  and  bargaining  which  have  been  witnessed, 
nobody  can  be  elected  without  being  involved  in  a  suspicion 
of  having  ploughed  with  another  man's  heifer.  Boutwell's 
message  is  well  written,  and  more  conservative  than  I  had 
expected.  He  means  to  be  Governor  next  year,  and  I  dare 
say  will  be.  Since  writing  the  above,  I  attended  morning 
service  at  the  Capitol,  to  hear  the  famous  Dr.  Hawks.  He 
preached  a  '  Union '  sermon,  powerful  in  parts,  but  interceding 
for  the  Union  as  if  it  were  on  the  very  verge  of  dissolution ; 
and  now,  I  suppose,  he  will  claim  the  credit  of  having  saved 
it.  The  mischief  of  all  this  is,  that  at  a  moment  when  there 
is  really  no  danger,  great  as  it  may  have  been,  we  are  exhaust- 

10 


146  A  MEMOIR  OF 

ing  our  pathos  to  such  a  degree  that  when  the  next  serious 
cause  for  alarm  arises  we  shall  be  mute  and  empty. 

[Jan.  31.]  The  30th  of  January  is  memorable  in  English 
history  as  the  day  of  the  '  Execution  of  the  Blessed  Martyr,' 
otherwise  Charles  I.  It  will  be  memorable  in  my  private 
calendar  as  the  day  when  a  corrupt  Coalition  put  a  not 
unwelcome  end  to  my  Congressional  career.  Precedents 
oblige  me  not  to  leave  Massachusetts  without  representation, 
so  here  I  sit  in  the  Senate  waiting  for  Rantoul's  arrival. 
Do  you  remember,  ever  so  long  ago,  in  the  days  when  he 
and  I  used  to  hammer  one  another  in  the  Legislature,  how  I 
once  called  him  in  debate  '  a  little  Matador e,  shaking  his  red 
flag  in  my  face  '  ?  And  now  he  comes  to  oust  me  from  my 
curule  chair.  You  do  not  always  appreciate  my  puns,  but 
if  I  dared  assimilate  myself  to  an  eagle,  I  might  suggest  a 
passable  one :  — 

*  An  Eagle,  towering  in  his  pride  of  place, 
Was  by  a  mousing  (Rant)  owl  hawked  at  and  killed.* 

During  this  last  session  Mr.  Winthrop's  speeches 
related  to  fiscal  and  other  questions  which  need  not 
be  described.  He  left  the  Senate  on  the  7th  of  Febru- 
ary, but  did  not  immediately  break  up  his  establish- 
ment in  Washington.  The  long-term  vacancy  not 
having  been  filled,  he  found  himself  still  a  candidate, 
though  with  no  expectation  of  proving  a  successful 
one.  It  was  not  until  the  24th  of  April  that  the  pro- 
tracted contest  in  the  Legislature  came  to  an  end,  the 
twenty-sixth  and  final  ballot  having  been  as  follows : 

Whole  number  of  votes  cast 384 

Necessary  to  a  choice 193 

Charles  Sumner  (Coalition) 193 

Robert  C.  Winthrop  (Whig) 166 

Scattering 25 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  147 

[Feb.  17.]  You  see  there  has  been  a  rumpus  and  a  riot  in 
Boston,  an  escape  from  the  Marshal,  etc.  It  is  lamentable  to 
have  such  a  triumph  given  to  Nullification  and  Rebellion,  yet, 
I  confess,  I  never  believed  that  Union  meetings  and  all  that 
sort  of  thing  were  going  to  cure  the  deep-seated  disaffection 
which  the  Fugitive  Law  has  engendered. 

[March  24.]  The  newspapers  having  hailed  my  return 
home  as  '  a  plain  Republican  citizen  after  so  many  years'  ser- 
vice in  the  public  councils,'  Choate  characteristically  greeted 
me  with  the  remark  that  he  could  not  see  that  I  was  any 
plainer  than  before.  Franklin  Dexter  wanted  to  get  up  a 
public  dinner,  but  I  would  not  hear  of  it.  I  have,  however, 
consented  to  sit  for  my  bust. 

[May  3.]  Morey  ^  and  other  friends  wish  to  run  me  for 
Governor  in  the  autumn,  a  sort  of  rallying  of  the  Whigs  for 
the  redemption  of  the  Commonwealth  under  my  lead.  I  do 
not  altogether  fancy  the  plan,  for  although  I  would  back  my- 
self for  a  20,000  plurality,  yet  our  Massachusetts  law  requires 
a  majority  over  all  others,  failing  which,  the  election  goes 
to  the  Legislature,  where  my  chances  would  be  dubious. 
Aside  from  this,  with  my  present  habits,  the  office  would  have 
no  charms.  To  have  been  Governor  of  Massachusetts,  at  an 
interval  of  more  than  two  hundred  years  after  my  great 
ancestor,  would  be  a  pleasant  historical  coincidence ;  but  to 
be  tethered  to  a  little  round  of  petty  duties,  daily  drudgery 
in  the  council-chamber,  riding  on  big  horses,  sitting  in  big 
chairs,  and  making  big  and  little  speeches  all  over  the  Com- 
monwealth, would  now  be  distasteful,  if  not  irksome,  to  me. 
...  A  story  went  the  rounds  here  a  week  or  two  ago,  that 
Clay  had  openly  said  in  Washington,  that  he  saw  '  nothing  to 
choose  between  Mr.  Winthrop  and  Mr.  Sumner.'  Now,  that 
Clay  may  have  unkindly  remembered  my  vote  against  his 
Compromise  is  eminently  probable,  —  that  he  and  other 
Southern  friends  regretted  much  of  my  course  in  the  Senate 

1  Hon.  George  Morey,  long  chairman  of  the  Whig  State  Central 
Committee. 


148  A  MEMOIR  OF 

is  certain,  —  but  that  he  seriously  said  what  is  reported  I  am 
slow  to  believe,  and  I  wish  you  would  confidentially  ascertain 
what  he  did  say.^  I  dare  say  that  both  Clay  and  Webster 
suspected  me  of  having  used  my  influence  as  Speaker  to  get 
Taylor  nominated.  I  did  no  such  thing,  but  scrupulously 
abstained'  from  any  interference ;  though  when  the  nomination 
was  made,  and  still  more  when  Taylor  was  fairly  elected,  I 
felt  bound  to  support  him  and  his  policy  so  far  as  I  conscien- 
tiously could.  I  stood  by  him  living,  and  could  see  nothing 
in  his  death  to  make  me  change  my  ground.  Hence  my 
opposition  to  Clay's  bill. 

[June  14.]  Our  Boston  men  keep  the  incense  burning 
under  Webster's  nose  with  more  than  the  assiduity  of  vestal 
virgins.  A  few  months  ago  they  were  satisfied  with  a  position 
of  defence,  but  they  now  assume  the  attack  and  are  for  driving 
others  to  the  wall.  Such  a  course  can  only  end  by  damaging 
the  party  irretrievably.  What  steps  John  Davis  and  others 
will  take,  I  do  not  yet  know,  but  I  shall  not  long  submit  in 
silence  to  such  insinuations  as  are  made ;  though  they  come 
from  hangers-on  and  underlings,  whose  names  you  never 
heard  of.  There  is,  besides,  a  fellow  who  writes  Boston 
letters  to  the  New  York  '  Herald,'  containing  malicious  fabri- 
cations, which  are  apparently  concocted  for  the  purpose  of 
sowing  dissensions  among  Whigs  to  the  profit  of  their 
opponents. 

[July  28.]  Crittenden  has  been  on  a  visit  to  me  and  we 
have  had  much  interesting  conversation  about  public  affairs, 
of  which  I  shall  have  a  good  deal  to  tell  you  when  we  meet. 
...  I  am  somewhat  puzzled  about  my  gubernatorial  candi- 
dacy, which  some  Websterites  are  openly  opposing,  the 
*  Courier '  proclaiming  that  I  have  not  a  particle  of  popu- 
larity about  me !  Morey,  on  the  other  hand  (whose  position 
and  experience  render  him  a  judge),  says  that  I  am  the  only 
man  upon  whom  the  Convention  could  possibly  unite  at  the 

^  Mr.  Clay  denied  having  said  an}i;hing  of  the  kind.  The  remark 
was  traced  to  Senator  Foote  of  Mississippi. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  149 

outset,  and  the  only  one  who  would  have  the  slightest  chance 
of  election.  I  would  give  much  for  a  long  talk  mth  Webster, 
to  know  precisely  how  he  feels,  if  he  chose  to  tell  me. 
Letter-writing  is  of  little  use  in  such  cases.  My  own  incli- 
nation is  not  to  seem  to  dodge  a  downfall,  or  evade  another 
defeat,  by  declining  to  run,  if  my  friends  urge  it.  The  party 
has  done  much  for  me  in  the  past,  and  I  must  do  what  I  can 
for  it  now.     I  need  not  stand  a  second  year. 

[Newport,  Aug.  11.]  Judge  Dayton  is  here.  He  saw  at  Wor- 
cester both  John  Davis  and  Levi  Lincoln,  who  told  him  that 
the  opposition  to  me  was  factitious  and  feeble.  At  Nahant  he 
met  Frank  Gray,  who  told  him  Webster  was  in  favor  of  me 
for  Governor  above  all  other  men!  On  the  heels  of  this 
appeared  George  T.  Curtis,  to  whom  I  frankly  complained  of 
the  way  in  which  certain  hangers-on  of  Webster  had  assailed 
me.  He  replied  that  he  regretted  it,  that  Webster  had  asked 
him  to  say  to  me  that  he  was  as  much  my  friend  as  ever,  but 
that  he  doubted  the  expediency  of  running  me  for  Governor 
for  a  couple  of  years,  for  the  reason  that  it  might  have  a  had 
effect  on  the  South,  jparticularly  in  Georgia.  This  reference  to 
Georgia  I  thought  a  little  comical,  as  Toombs  is  engaged  in 
supporting  a  Democrat  for  Governor  there,  the  local  Whig 
party  being  practically  disbanded.  I  told  Curtis  I  would 
consider  the  subject,  but  that  the  message  should  have  come 
earlier,  that  I  was  partly  committed,  etc.  I  think  I  shall  hold 
my  tongue  and  let  things  take  their  course.  Massachusetts 
Whigs  can  surely  nominate  whom  they  please  in  a  bye-year 
without  consulting  Southern  opinion.^ 

[Sept.  29.]  We  found  at  Lowell,  instead  of  a  cattle-show, 
a  sort  of  miniature  World's  Fair.  So  I  left  out  all  my  talk 
about  bullocks  and  manure,  and  substituted  a  few  common- 
places about  Arts  and  Manufactures.  Everett  made  a  beauti- 
ful speech,   with  perhaps   a   little   too  much  Latin  for  his 

1  The  Whig  State  convention  of  1851  was  held  at  Springfield  on  the 
11th  of  September.  Upon  the  first  ballot  for  Governor,  Mr.  Winthrop 
received  811  votes,  to  210  for  Samuel  H.  Walley,  the  Webster  candidate. 


150  A  MEMOIR   OF 

audience.  There  is  nobody  like  him  for  such  occasions.  He 
shines  out  velut  inter  ignes  hona  minores.  Not  that  I  mean 
to  imply  that  he  is  given  to  moonshine,  for  he  is  really 
splendid   and   shines   with  no   borrowed  light. 

[Oct.  26.]  I  sent  you  my  Mechanic  Charitable  Address. 
I  have  made  three  or  four  more,  Agricultural  and  otherwise, 
but  nothing  political.  '  These  little  things  are  great  to  little 
men.'  From  all  I  can  learn,  Fillmore  is  the  favorite  of  the 
Southern  Whigs,  but  if  you  read  your  New  York  '  Herald ' 
duly,  you  will  see  that  Crittenden  spent  a  week  with  me  for 
the  purpose  of  negotiating  matters  for  Scott!  The  leading 
Free-Soil  organ  here  says  I  am  very  ambitious,  a  mere 
politician,  and  ready  to  make  any  sacrifice  for  advancement, 
but  if  the  writer  only  knew  how  sick  I  am  of  the  emptiness 
and  distraction  of  public  life,  he  would  give  me  credit  for  less 
management.^  Morey  is  still  sanguine  about  the  election,  but 
Clifford  is  a  perfect  Cassandra.  For  myself,  I  am  utrumque 
paratus.  There  are  so  many  things  which  I  wish  to  do,  but 
which  I  cannot  do  if  I  am  chosen,  and  so  many  things  which 
I  don't  wish  to  do,  but  which  I  must  do  if  I  serve,  that  the 
pros  and  cons  have  a  tendency  to  leave  me  in  a  state  of 
apathy. 

[Nov.  20.]  My  vote  was  a  glorious  one,  8,000  more  than 
Briggs  got  last  year,  and  nearly  4,000  more  than  Taylor 
received  three  years  ago,  —  and  this  in  the  largest  vote  ever 
tlirown  in  the  State,  and  in  spite  of  much  lukewarmness,  and 


^  The  reference  is  to  a  leader  in  the  Boston  "  Commonwealth  "  of  Oct. 
25, 1851,  dealing  at  length  with  Mr.  Winthrop's  career,  and  describing  him 
as  a  man  "  whose  sympathies  are  with  the  rich,  —  with  the  money  power ; 
his  aim,  like  theirs,  political  success  as  an  end,  not  as  a  means ;  his 
method  of  gaining  it,  like  theirs,  tortuous,  uncandid,  false  ;  his  principles, 
like  theirs,  sitting  loosely  on  him,  enabling  him  always  to  present  that 
front  which  circumstances  may  seem  to  demand  for  the  moment.  He 
never  knew  what  it  was  to  earn  his  own  bread,  and  he  is  far  removed 
from  any  knowledge  of,  or  sympathy  with,  the  great  mass  of  the  com- 
munity whose  lot  is  so  different.  He  is  thus  almost  the  only  man  of  any 
note  in  New  England  who  is  a  politician  b7/  profession." 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  151 

probably  some  defection,  in  a  quarter  you  wot  of.  Indeed, 
but  for  the  unaccountable  loss  of  Lowell,  we  should  have 
controlled  the  General  Court.  My  plurality  over  Boutwell 
exceeds  20,000,  over  Palfrey  nearly  36,000 ;  but,  with  our 
majority  system,  a  coalition  can  elect  a  minority  candidate 
in  the  Legislature,  which  will  probably  prove  the  case  in 
January.  My  friends  say  'better  luck  next  time,'  but 
between  ourselves  there  is  not  likely  to  be  any  next  time  for 
me.  I  am  tired  of  it  all  and  mean  to  stand  aside  for  several 
years,  if  not  permanently.  Clifford  would  make  an  excellent 
Whig  Governor.  So  would  Charles  Pludson  or  Julius  Rock- 
well. I  might  easily  name  others.  Say  nothing  of  this,  as 
it  will  not  be  made  public  for  some  time.  .  .  .  People  here 
are,  as  usual,  all  agog  for  making  Webster  President,  but 
you  and  I  think  alike  as  to  his  chances.  I  am  ready  to  vote 
for  him,  for  Fillmore,  for  Scott,  or  for  any  other  good  man 
who  may  receive  the  nomination,  and  I  have  as  little  fancy 
as  you  for  Free-Soil  alliances ;  but  we  are  doomed  to  defeat 
under  almost  any  imaginable  circumstances.  It  looks  to  me 
as  if  the  Democrats  were  as  sure  to  carry  the  next  general 
election,  as  the  seasons  are  to  roll  round.  Though  not  tech- 
nically a  Webster  Whig,  I  would  have  given  much  to  have 
seen  Webster  President  before  he  died,  but  he  will  now 
never  get  even  as  many  electoral  votes  as  he  got  in  1836. 
Strange  that  so  great  a  man  should  occasionally  be  so  blind  to 
political  situations ;  besides  which,  I  have  some  doubt  if  his 
life  is  worth  a  year's  insurance. 

The  story  above  alluded  to,  that  Mr.  Winthrop  had 
co-operated  with  John  J.  Crittenden  in  trying  to 
effect  the  nomination  of  General  Scott,  together  with 
another  story  (not  improbably  from  the  same  source) 
that  he  had  strongly  recommended  running  Fillmore  in 
preference  to  Webster,  found  its  way  from  time  to  time 
into  the  newspapers  in  the  winter  of  1852,  sometimes 


152  A  MEMOIR  OF 

accompanied  by  the  insinuation  that  Mr.  Winthrop, 
although  fully  consulted  by  Mr.  Webster  before  his  7th 
of  March  speech,  had  purposely  left  his  great  leader 
in  the  lurch.  Mr.  Winthrop  was  much  stung  by  this 
charge,  but  preferred  not  to  take  any  notice  of  it,  until 
he  saw  in  a  New  York  paper  a  report  of  some  remarks 
of  Mr.  Webster,  in  which  no  names  were  mentioned, 
but  which  might  have  been  construed  as  giving  a  sort 
of  color  to  what  had  been  said.  Under  date  of  March 
15,  1852,  he  accordingly  wrote  Mr.  Webster  :  — 

I  have  no  disposition  to  draw  you  into  private  or  public 
controversy,  but  I  must  be  perfectly  candid  in  saying  to  you 
that,  in  answer  to  frequent  questions  at  the  time  and  since, 
whether  I  was  consulted  by  Mr.  Webster  on  the  subject  of 
his  speech  before  it  was  delivered,  or  whether  he  communi- 
cated to  me  in  advance  his  views  and  purposes  in  making 
it,  —  I  have  uniformly  replied  in  the  negative.  On  the  other 
hand,  I  had  many  reasons  for  supposing,  when  I  myself  made 
a  speech  just  a  fortnight  previously,  on  the  21st  of  February, 
that,  in  taking  distinct  ground  in  favor  of  General  Taylor's 
platform,  I  was  expressing  myself  in  conformity  to  your 
views,  and  that  I  should  be  found  acting  where  I  had  always 
been  proud  to  act,  under  your  lead.^  I  cannot  but  think  that, 
if  the  report  of  your  remarks  be  correct,  you  are  under  some 
misapprehension  as  to  what  occurred  hefore^  and  what  after^ 
the  7th  of  March,  1850. 

A  temporary  absence  from  Washington  and  a  pres- 
sure of  public  business  prevented  Mr.  Webster  from 
replying  until  April  8,  when  he  wrote  :  — 

"  It  is  certainly  true  that  you  were  not  consulted  upon  the 
subject  of  my  speech  before  it  was  delivered,  and  that  I  did 
not  communicate  to  you  in  advance  my  views  and  purposes 
1  See  ante,  pp.  110-111. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  153 

in  making  it.  At  the  same  time,  I  am  at  a  loss  to  know  what 
reason  you  had  for  supposing,  on  the  21st  of  February,  that  I 
was  in  favor  of  General  Taylor's  platform.  Before  that  time, 
and  in  a  long  conversation  with  General  Taylor,  —  the  only 
one  I  ever  had  with  him  on  any  matter  of  importance,  —  I 
distinctly  stated  to  him  that  I  did  not  at  all  concur  with  him 
in  his  views ;  that  I  was  for  one  general  and  final  adjustment 
of  all  the  questions ;  and  that,  as  for  the  admission  of  Cali- 
fornia, leaving  all  other  questions  equally  important  to  be 
discussed  and  quarrelled  about  thereafter,  I  thought  such  a 
proceeding  very  likely  to  lead  to  civil  Avar.  It  gave  me 
infinite  pain  to  differ  with  you,  and  the  rest  of  my  colleagues, 
on  that  exigent  and  critical  occasion.  Certainly  I  doubted 
not  the  patriotism  and  good  purposes  of  any  of  you.  But  the 
path  of  my  own  duties  seemed  plain,  and  I  was  ready  to  tread 
it  at  all  hazards.  The  consequence  was  that  I  found  myself 
engaged  in  a  controversy  of  great  moment,  to  be  fought  on  a 
field  in  which  I  had  neither  a  leader  nor  a  follower  from 
among  my  own  immediate  friends. 

"  And  now  let  me  add,  my  dear  sir,  that  there  is  no  man  in 
whose  public  career  I  have  heretofore  taken  more  interest  and 
concern  than  in  yours.  I  have  known  and  appreciated  your 
intelligence,  your  patriotism,  your  fitness  for  high  public  em- 
ployment. I  have  ever  spoken  of  you  as  one  from  whom 
the  country  had  much  to  expect,  and  I  still  cherish  the 
fervent  ho|)e  that  you  may  yet  enjoy  in  full  measure  the 
rich  reward  of  public  approbation  for  distinguished  public 


Under  date  of  April  14,  Mr.  Winthrop  rejoined :  — 

I  thank  you  for  the  kind  expressions  with  which  your  letter 
concludes.  It  is  in  vain  for  me  to  conceal  that  the  tone  of 
some  of  those  in  this  quarter,  who  are  supposed  to  enjoy  your 
confidence,  had  conspired  with  other  circumstances  in  leading 
me  to  doubt  in  what  relation  to  you  I  was  at  liberty  to  class 


154  A  MEMOIR  OF 

myself.  This  must  account  for  anything  of  unaccustomed 
formality  in  my  last  letter.  I  gladly  accept  the  renewed 
assurance  of  your  friendly  regard.  You  must  allow  me  to 
say,  however,  that  there  are  still  some  points  of  difference 
between  us  in  relation  to  the  history  of  the  past.  My  first 
impulse  was  to  sit  down  and  write  you  a  full  account  of  the 
reasons  which  I  had  for  thinking  that,  on  the  21st  of  Febru- 
ary, 1850,  I  was  expressing  your  sentiments  as  well  as  my 
own.  I  had  proposed  also  to  state  some  facts  and  views 
which  rendered  it  all  but  impossible  that  you  could  have 
entertained,  at  that  time  or  for  many  weeks  afterward,  the 
strong  and  unqualified  opinions  as  to  the  danger  of  adopting 
General  Taylor's  plan,  which  you  now  express.  I  am  reluct- 
ant, however,  to  trouble  you  with  any  long  statements  or 
arguments  upon  a  subject  of  no  immediate  practical  interest, 
while  you  are  so  much  occupied  with  official  and  professional 
duties.  If  the  time  should  come  when  I  should  be  in  the  way 
of  meeting  you  personally  on  our  old  footing,  and  when  you 
should  be  willing  and  disposed  for  a  free  conference  upon 
those  questions,  I  am  certain  I  could  remind  you  of  circum- 
stances which,  I  dare  say,  left  less  impression  on  your  mind 
than  upon  my  own,  but  which  were  hardly  susceptible  of 
misconstruction. 

The  only  political  speech  of  any  importance  made  by 
Mr.  Winthrop  in  1852  was  on  the  29th  of  June  in 
Fanenil  Hall,  when  he  presided  at  a  meeting  to  ratify 
the  nomination  of  General  Scott  for  the  Presidency  by 
the  General  Convention  of  the  Whig  party  at  Baltimore, 
and  when,  in  their  bitter  disappointment,  many  Webster 
Whigs  had  threatened  to  bolt  the  ticket.  I  quote  but  a 
few  sentences :  — 

We  have  come  together  as  Whigs,  —  not  merely  Boston 
Whigs,  and  Massachusetts  Whigs,  but  national  Whigs, — 
members  of  a  party  coextensive  with  our  whole  widespread 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  155 

Union.  We  are  here  not  forgetting  that  we  have  principles 
to  maintain,  which  are  far  above  all  consideration  of  persons ; 
that  we  have  a  cause  and  a  country  to  support  and  uphold, 
independently  of  all  questions  about  individual  pretensions 
or  preferences.  We  all  know  that  if  Daniel  Webster  had 
been  nominated  by  the  National  Convention,  and  if  this 
meeting  had  been  summoned  to  respond  to  that  nomination, 
this  hall,  capacious  and  elastic  as  it  is,  would  not  have  con- 
tained the  multitudes  who  would  have  crowded  and  thronged 
its  portals.  We  should  all  have  been  here,  and  the  '  Old 
Cradle '  would  have  rocked  again,  as  in  its  infancy,  with 
your  exulting  shouts.  And  shall  it  be  said,  for  a  moment, 
that  the  Whigs  of  Suffolk  were  only  true  to  their  colors  when 
their  own  wishes  were  gratified,  and  when  their  own  candi- 
dates were  successful  ?  Shall  it  be  said  of  us,  as  it  was  once 
said  of  ancient  Rome,  that  Octavius  had  a  party,  and  Antony 
a  party,  but  that  the  Republic  had  no  party  ?  I  observe  that 
when  a  procession  of  Baltimore  Whigs  meet  your  own  proces- 
sion of  delegates  at  the  gates  of  the  Monumental  city,  they 
marched  beneath  a  banner  bearing  this  inscription :  '  We  go 
for  the  nominee.'  That  escort  was  accepted ;  and  that  ban- 
ner was  not  repudiated.  And  upon  the  walls  of  the  vast 
Assembly-room  where  the  delegates  were  convened  there  was 
inscribed,  if  I  mistake  not,  our  old  watchword  of  victory  in 
1840,  '  The  union  of  the  Whigs  for  the  sake  of  the  Union.' 
All  this,  I  am  persuaded,  was  no  mere  empty  and  delusive 
show.  It  meant  something.  And  the  meaning  was  nothing 
else,  and  could  have  been  nothing  else,  than  that  which  our 
State  Convention  and  our  Legislative  Convention,  and  all 
our  local  conventions,  had  previously  declared,  —  that  we 
intended  to  abide  by  the  decision  of  the  tribunal  to  which  we 
had  appealed,  and  to  give  our  support  to  the  candidates 
which  it  should  select.  Shall  we  break  our  swords  and 
abandon  our  colors  and  go  over  to  the  enemy,  because  we 
cannot  have  the  precise  leader  of  our  choice  to  conduct  us  to 
victory  ?     Shall  we  abandon  the  cause  of  American  industry, 


156  A  MEMOIR  OF 

of  river  and  harbor  improvements,  and  of  a  sound  pacific 
foreign  policy,  out  of  any  mere  personal  griefs  ?  Shall  we 
overturn  the  coach  because  we  cannot  have  our  own  favorite 
driver,  or  even  because  we  may  not  exactly  fancy  some  of 
our  fellow-passengers  ?  For  myself  I  can  only  say  that,  let 
who  will  be  on  the  box  or  who  will  get  up  behind,  let  who  will 
be  inside  and  who  outside,  as  long  as  it  keeps  along  on  the 
straight  road  and  in  the  well-worn  ruts  of  the  Constitution, 
I  am  for  holding  fast  to  the  good  old  Whig  Union  line.  .  .  . 
Let  us  then  take  the  first  step  to  confirm  and  carry  out  the 
acts  to  which  we  ourselves  have  been  parties.  Let  us  prove 
that  no  degree  or  depth  of  personal  disappointment  can  pre- 
vent us  from  keeping  our  plighted  troth  with  the  Whigs  of 
other  States,  or  from  doing  unto  others  what  we  should  have 
expected  and  demanded  of  others  to  do  unto  us. 

A  few  weeks  later,  by  an  appointment  of  the  Alumni 
of  Harvard,  he  delivered  at  their  decennial  celebration, 
July  22,  1852,  an  elaborate  address,  entitled,  The  Ob- 
ligations and  Responsibilities  of  Educated  Men  in  the 
use  of  the  tongue  and  of  the  pen. 

[Nahant,  July  23.]  Thank  Heaven,  no  orator  is  expected 
to  deliver  two  Alumni  Addresses.  Mine  was  on  the  easel  a 
long  time  and  I  gave  it  a  daub  now  and  then,  but  somehow 
or  other  the  colors  had  a  tendency  to  dry  on  the  palette.  It 
has  some  tolerable  passages,  and  some  good  sober  truths, 
which  the  times  require.  The  height  of  the  pulpit  and  the 
immediate  proximity  of  our  venerable  Chief  Justice  (who 
occasionally  purred  applause)  interfered  somewhat  with  my 
gesticulation ;  and  then,  too,  I  am  not  accustomed  to  be 
hampered  by  a  manuscript,  which  the  length  of  this  produc- 
tion necessitated  for  part  of  the  time.  Charles  G.  Loring 
was  kind  enough  to  say  I  had  done  more  good  than  had  been 
done  by  any  address  at  Harvard  for  thirty  years,  while 
Everett  was  overwhelming  in  his  approbation  ;  but  one  must 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  157 

deduct  a  large  percentage  from  the  congratulations  of  friends.^ 
In  spite  of  remonstrances  from  Morey,  John  C.  Gray,  and 
others,  I  adhere  to  the  purpose  I  privately  expressed  many 
months  ago  of  not  running  again  for  Governor,  though  I  am 
assured  there  is  little  or  no  doubt  that  we  shall  this  year 
control  the  Legislature.  Aside  from  my  weariness  of  politics, 
I  am  for  harmony  in  the  party.  The  disappointment  of  the 
Websterites  is  disposed  to  exhibit  itself  in  vengeance  upon 
everybody  who  dares  intimate  that  it  was  anything  less  than 
treason  to  say  that  Fillmore  would  have  made  a  good  candidate, 
or  that  Scott  is  a  good  one.  If  I  really  wanted  the  office,  I 
would  defy  this  intolerance  and  take  the  stump,  but  I  grow 
more  and  more  enamoured  of  private  life  and  see  various 
channels  in  which  I  may  be  useful.  Give  my  cordial  remem- 
brances to  the  President  and  tell  him  that  his  course  since 
the  nomination  has  given  him  a  fresh  hold  on  the  hearts  of 
his  friends.  No  man  has  so  much  right  to  complain  of  the 
result  as  he,  but  he  has  proved  that  he  knows  how  to  bear 
the  downs,  as  well  as  the  ups,  of  political  fortune. 

Mr.  Winthrop's  withdrawal  excited  much  comment. 
The  Boston  correspondent  of  the  Springfield  "  Republi- 
can" wrote  as  follows,  under  date  of  Aug.  9,  1852  : 

"  Mr.  Winthrop's  action  has  stirred  the  political  waters.  Not 
unexpected  to  the  knowing  ones,  it  took  the  public  at  large 
by  surprise.  He  was  looked  upon  as  the  next  Governor  of 
Massachusetts,   as   but   for  his   imperative   declination,   his 

1  Xo  such  allowance  need  he  made  in  the  case  of  opponents.  A  leader 
in  the  Boston  "Commonwealth"  of  July  27,  1852,  says  :  "We  have  read 
Mr.  Winthrop's  Oration  before  the  Alumni  of  Harvard  with  a  feeling  of 
very  agreeable  surprise.  In  power  and  beauty,  in  elevation  of  thought 
and  principle,  in  force  and  grace  of  expression,  it  will  take  its  place  in  the 
foremost  ranks  of  American  eloquence.  No  competent  person  can  read 
it,  and  honestly  deny  Mr.  Winthrop's  claim  to  as  high  a  position  among 
our  orators  and  writers  as  is  held  by  any  other  living  man.  It  is  masterly 
in  style,  and  glows  throughout  with  what  we  are  ready  to  accept,  for  the 
most  part,  as  sound,  patriotic,  and  truly  Christian  sentiment." 


158  A  MEMOIR   OF 

nomination  by  the  Whig  Convention  would  have  been  almost 
an  act  of  spontaneous  unanimity,  and  his  subsequent  election 
quite  equally  a  matter  of  course.  For  it  must  be  impossible 
that  the  Coalition,  hoary  with  political  sin  and  inconsistency, 
though  but  two  years  in  existence,  should  longer  blot  the 
fame  of  Massachusetts  and  be  a  stench  in  the  nostrils  of  the 
nation.  Mr.  Winthrop  does  not  decline  because  he  would 
not  like  to  be  Governor.  This  is  an  ambition  worthy  of  and 
honorable  to  him.  But  he  prefers  the  harmony  and  the  unity 
of  the  party  to  his  own  advancement.  He  prefers,  too,  not 
to  be  the  object  of  a  rancorous  spite  and  a  party  jealousy, 
that,  because  he  could  not  agree  to  follow  the  lead  of  some 
of  his  old  political  associates,  has  been  poured  out  upon  him 
during  the  past  year  and  has  threatened  to  pursue  him  still 
more  bitterly.  Mr.  Winthrop  is  no  political  idol  of  mine.  I 
have  differed  from  him  on  questions  of  policy  in  relation  to 
men  and  measures,  —  I  think  he  has  made  mistakes  in  his 
political  course,  —  but  that  he  is  a  true,  staunch,  reliable, 
devoted  Whig,  firm  and  inflexible  in  his  devotion  to  the 
essentials  of  the  Whig  creed,  broad  and  generous  in  his 
nationality,  yielding  and  sacrificing  in  his  personal  feelings 
for  the  sake  of  the  greater  good,  —  that  he  is  all  this,  and 
that  he  deserves  well  of  the  Whigs  of  Massachusetts  and  of 
the  Union,  I  do  confidently  assert  and  insist.  .  .  .  What  part 
Mr.  Winthrop  took  in  securing  General  Scott's  nomination,  I 
know  not.  I  doubt  if  it  was  active  or  large ;  but,  nevertheless, 
he  seemed  to  be  the  mark  against  which  the  sadly  disappointed 
feelings  of  many  of  Mr.  Webster's  supporters  here  turned  with 
an  idea  of  '  revenge,'  which  appears  to  me  as  senseless  and  illib- 
eral as  it  is  unjust.  Out  of  Boston  scarcely  any  man  would 
command  more  votes  than  Mr.  Winthrop,  while  here  in  Boston 
his  generous  conduct  and  manly  sacrifice  will  have  the  effect 
to  strengthen  and  reunite  the  old  Whig  phalanx." 

Extracts  from   Mr.    Winthrop' s   private   letters   are 
liere  resumed :  — 


EGBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  159 

[Sept.  T.]  In  an  evil  hour  I  some  time  ago  consented  to 
discourse  at  length  upon  American  Agriculture  at  Taunton, 
on  the  18th  of  next  month.^  The  heat  has  caused  me  to 
defer  preparation  for  it,  and  I  am  now  repenting  my  good 
nature.  I  gave  a  note  to  you  to  a  representative  of  the 
Boston  '  Atlas,'  who  visits  Washington  in  hopes  to  have  the 
proscription  of  that  paper  removed.  You  know  all  about  this 
business.  The  '  Atlas '  is  a  thoroughgoing  Whig  paper,  ener- 
getic and  impulsive.  Not  always  prudent,  but  always  prompt. 
Not  always  cautious,  but  always  courageous.  Many  things 
in  it  have  at  times  displeased  many  of  its  friends,  but,  on  the 
whole,  no  paper  has  been  more  devoted  to  the  Whig  cause. 
It  did  not  cry  Shibboleth  to  the  Compromise,  nor  Amen  to 
the  7th  of  March,  yet  it  has  given  manly  support  to  the 
Administration,  and  is  uncompromising  in  its  adherence  to 
the  Baltimore  Convention  and  its  candidates.  Webster  took 
away  his  patronage  and  gave  it  to  the  '  Courier,'  and  its  editors 
now  feel  that  an  occasional  official  notice  in  its  columns 
would  do  away  with  the  impression  that  the  Administration 
is  throwing  its  weight  into  the  scale  of  the  Webster  sizzle  in 
this  quarter,  and  would  give  emphasis  to  the  '  Atlas '  in  sus- 
taining Scott.  It  is  too  important  a  paper  to  be  put  under  a 
ban.  ...  I  don't  think  you  quite  do  justice  to  '  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin.'  Greatly  as  political  agitation  of  the  slavery  question 
is  to  be  deprecated,  ought  there  not,  now  and  then,  to  be 
something  said  in  a  literary  or  moral   way,  to  keep  alive  a 

^  Mr.  Winthrop  was  long  a  Trustee  of  the  Massachusetts  Society  for 
the  Promotion  of  Agriculture,  of  which  his  father  had  been  president. 
His  agricultural  tastes  were  acquired  when  a  small  boy  on  Naushon 
Island,  then  the  property  of  a  maternal  uncle  of  his,  and  where  he  often 
went  for  weeks  at  a  time.  Sheep-farming  was  then  practised  there  on 
a  considerable  scale,  and  Mr.  Winthrop's  earliest  suit  of  clothes  was  made 
from  the  Island  wool.  These  leanings  were  further  developed  by  his  first 
wife's  having  inherited  the  Gardner  farm  in  Wenham,  where  during  her 
life  he  habitually  spent  a  part  of  each  summer.  His  subsequent  mar- 
riages associated  him,  first,  with  a  farm  in  Dorchester,  now  built  over, 
and  later  with  a  country  seat  in  Brookline,  where  he  much  resided  for 
many  years,  and  took  constant  pleasure  in  its  horticultural  attractions. 


160  A  MEMOIR   OF 

proper  state  of  sentiment  in  regard  to  the  real  character  of 
the  institution  ?  The  book  may  be  a  good  deal  exaggerated  in 
some  parts,  but  I  think  it  exhibits  some  of  the  lights  as  well 
as  shades  of  slaveiy,  and  does  great  justice  to  some  features  of 
Southern  character.  It  will  do  no  harm  to  inculcate  in  the 
young  Southern  mind  (which  I  think  it  will  reach)  a  feeling 
of  impatience  at  the  idea  tliat  slavery  is  to  be  perpetual.  You 
must  not  judge  of  the  work  only  by  the  ravings  of  Anti- 
slavery  Conventions. 

[Oct.  25.]  I  returned  from  my  sister's  at  Augusta  just  in 
time  to  meet  the  appalling  announcement  of  Webster's  immi- 
nent peril.  Last  night  I  dreamed  that  I  was  exchanging 
with  him  renewed  assurances  of  mutual  confidence  and  regard, 
but  I  awoke  to  the  sound  of  minute-guns  and  tolling  bells, 
which  announced  his  end.  It  has  affected  me  deeply.  I 
could  have  cried  about  it  all  day  with  a  good  will,  especially 
if  my  tears  could  have  blotted  out  a  few  things  from  the 
eventful  record  which  has  just  been  closed.  What  a  man  he 
might  have  been !  Yet  let  us  not  do  injustice,  or  forget  what 
a  man  he  was.  Mighty  in  intellect,  majestic  in  form,  un- 
tiring in  energy,  —  the  impress  of  greatness  was  upon  him  all 
over  in  larger  characters  than  have  appeared  anywhere  within 
our  region  and  within  our  day.  One  could  never  see  him,  or 
hear  him,  without  thinking  of  Hamlet's  apostrophe  to  man. 
'  How  noble  in  reason !  how  infinite  in  faculty  !  in  apprehen- 
sion how  like  a  god!  '  It  is  twenty-four  years  since  I 
entered  his  law-ofiice,  and  until  last  year,  rarely  a  month  has 
passed  without  -my  being  more  or  less  associated  with  him. 
He  has  not  always  treated  me  as  I  could  have  wished,  or  as  I 
think  I  deserved.  I  owe  him  nothing,  though  perhaps  I  have 
to  thank  his  friends  for  my  defeat  for  Governor.  But  I 
rejoice  to  think  he  has  never  wanted  a  good  turn  from  me, 
whenever  I  had  a  real  opportunity  of  doing  him  one.  I 
should  be  willing  to  compare  notes  to-day  with  the  most 
forward  of  those  who  have  been  seeking  fame  from  his 
friendship,  or  making  capital  out  of  his  infirmities,  or  stealing 


ROBERT   C.   WIXTHROP.  161 

notoriety  from  his  very  death-bed,  —  as  to  the  amount  of  real 
service  which  has  been  rendered  him  by  ns  respectively  dur- 
ing nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century  past.  I  have  always  made 
great  allowances  for  any  expressions  of  irritation  he  may 
latterly  have  let  fall  about  my  course,  at  moments  when  he 
was  ill  and  disapj)ointed ;  but  I  am,  as  you  know,  a  sensitive 
man,  and  the  malice  of  some  of  his  retainers  has  galled  me 
deeply.    Enough,  perhaps  too  much,  of  this. 

[Nov.  29.]  This  will  be  handed  you  by  my  particular 
friend  Clifford,  who  will  be  chosen  Governor  of  Massachu- 
setts as  soon  as  our  Legislature  meets.  Let  him  know  some 
of  the  secrets  which  you  may  not  be  disposed  to  trust  on 
paper.  I  was  profoundly  astonished  by  the  telegraphic  gossip 
that  I  was  a  candidate  for  the  State  Department.  Fillmore 
knows  how  I  feel  about  this ;  and  if  any  politicians  in  this 
quarter  pressed  my  name,  it  was  without  my  knowledge  and 
against  my  wishes.  I  fully  supposed  Crittenden  would  suc- 
ceed Webster,  and  there  are  reasons  wdiy  this  might  have 
been  the  wisest  choice ;  but  Everett  is  admirably  qualified  to 
finish  up  Webster's  work  and  was  cut  out  for  a  minister  of 
Foreign  Affairs.  You  will  have  noted  that  I  headed  the 
Scott  ticket  in  this  State.  His  defeat  has  been  laughably 
overwhelming,  but  I  rejoice  that  his  vote  in  the  Electoral 
College  will  be  divided  between  two  sections  of  the  Union, 
Vermont  and  Massachusetts  standing  shoulder  to  shoulder 
with  Tennessee  and  Kentucky.  Let  us  hope  we  shall  learn 
a  little  wisdom  during  the  next  four  years. 

[Jan.  13, 1853.]  So  our  friend  Mrs. says  I  am  'repin- 
ing at  my  political  reverses.'  I  could  make  a  shrewd  guess 
at  the  source  of  that  suggestion.  Oddly  enough  your  letter 
came  when  a  political  prize  was  again  within  my  reach. 
John  Davis's  term  expiring  in  March,  and  he  having  fully 
decided  to  retire,  I  was  strongly  urged  to  allow  myself  to  be 
put  in  nomination  and  I  was  assured  that  this  time  my  elec- 
tion would  be  certain,  in  spite  of  some  opposition  from 
Webster  Whigs  in  the  Convention.     I  confess  I  was  a  little 

11 


162  A  MEMOIR  OF 

tempted,  but  on  thinking  the  whole  matter  carefully  over,  I 
determined  to  adhere  to  my  original  decision  to  eschew  all  can- 
didacies for  some  years  to  come,  if  not  permanently.  I  have 
no  longer  a  house  in  Washington,  and  I  have  not  the  faintest 
wish  to  go  back  there,  save  on  an  occasional  visit  to  you  or 
some  personal  friend.  There  are  all  sorts  of  reasons,  domes- 
tic and  otherwise,  which  dispose  me  to  remain  quietly  here. 
Nevertheless,  I  would  go  if  I  really  felt  I  could  accomplish 
anything ;  but  what  good  could  I  do,  with  Frank  Pierce  in 
the  White  House  and  a  democratic  majority  in  both  branches  ? 
My  votes  and  my  speeches  would  fail,  as  heretofore,  to  satisfy 
extremists,  and  I  should  be  at  continual  variance  with  my 
own  colleague.  It  is  understood  that  Everett  is  not  unwilling 
to  accept,  and  he  is  a  man  upon  whom  we  can  all  agree. 
Whether  he  will  long  fancy  such  a  post,  in  the  present  con- 
dition of  the  country,  I  have  my  doubts.  I  will  not  affect  to 
deny  that,  after  an  absence  of  eleven  winters,  Boston  occa- 
sionally seems  a  trifle  narrow  and  a  trifle  humdrum.  The 
gatherings  of  our  Historical  Society,  of  the  vestry  of  Trinity 
Church  and  other  local  bodies,  are  perhaps  a  little  tame  to 
one  who  has  passed  so  many  years  at  work  on  the  affairs  of 
the  Nation.  But  I  am  getting  thoroughly  accustomed  to  it 
all,  and  I  see  many  ways  in  which  I  can  be  useful,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  opportunity  of  undertaking  some  long-post- 
poned biographical  work,  and  freedom  to  go  to  Europe  when 
it  suits  me.  I  enclose  my  letter  to  Judge  Warren  ^  declining 
to  stand. 

VIII. 

Although  Mr.  Winthrop  was  now,  by  his  own  choice, 
not  in  what  is  technically  known  as  "  public  life/'  — 
the  tenure  of,  or  candidacy  for,  a  National  or  State  office, 
—  it  was  in  no  degree  his  intention  to  hold  his  tongue  on 

^  Our  former  associate,  Charles  H.  Warren,  then  President  of 
Massachusetts  State  Senate. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  163 

the  great  questions  of  the  day ;  and  though,  in  the  course 
of  the  next  twelve  years,  his  various  public  utterances 
gradually  assumed  more  and  more  a  historical,  educa- 
tional, philanthropic,  or  religious  character,  yet  when 
properly  urged,  or  when  he  felt  it  to  be  a  duty,  he  had 
no  hesitation  in  expressing  his  political  views,  some- 
times in  a  platform  speech,  sometimes  in  a  published 
letter.  Thus,  on  the  28th  of  September,  1853,  in  pre- 
siding over  the  Whig  State  Convention  at  Fitchburg,  he 
indulged  in  some  plain-spoken  criticism  of  the  Massa- 
chusetts Coalition,  in  a  speech  from  which  I  quote  a 
single  passage  :  — 

I  am  not  so  bigoted  a  partisan  as  to  grudge  to  our  adver- 
saries an  occasional  possession  of  power,  either  in  the  nation 
at  large,  or  in  our  own  State.  I  am  willing  to  admit  that 
the  revolutions  of  parties  in  a  free  country  are  sometimes 
productive  of  positive  good,  and  that  the  rolling  wheel  of 
political  fortune  is  sometimes  a  wheel  of  progress  and  reform. 
And,  let  me  add,  I  am  always  ready  to  welcome  a  true  pro- 
gress and  a  just  reform,  from  whatever  quarter  it  may  come, 
and  by  whatever  rotation  it  may  be  accomplished.  But  I 
confess,  when  I  reflect  on  the  doubtful  and  dangerous  coun- 
sels to  which  our  country  has  been  recently  committed  ;  when 
I  think  of  the  perils  which  may  be  at  this  moment  impending 
over  our  foreign  and  domestic  relations,  from  the  extravagant 
and  reckless  policy  of  some  of  those  who  occupy  the  high 
places  of  the  nation ;  and  when,  still  more,  I  contemplate  the 
injury  which  has  been  inflicted  upon  the  character  of  our  own 
Massachusetts,  as  a  State,  and  the  even  deeper  and  more  per- 
manent injury  which  is  just  ready  to  be  inflicted  on  our  own 
Massachusetts'  Constitution,  —  I  cannot  help  deploring  the 
day  vfhich  introduced  divisions  and  distractions  into  the  ranks 
of  a  party,  which  ought  to  have  saved,  which  might  have 
saved,  both  State  and  Nation.     I  cannot  help  deploring  the 


164  A  MEMOIR   OF 

day  which  saw  that  party  throw  away  the  opportunity  of 
saving  anything,  in  order  to  indulge  in  mere  personal  dissen- 
sions and  family  feuds. 

A  few  weeks  earlier,  on  the  6th  of  Septemberj  he  had 
delivered  an  address  at  Groton,  in  Connecticut,  at  the 
celebration  of  the  seventy-second  anniversary  of  the  Rev- 
olutionary tragedy  of  Groton  Heights,  and  a  few  weeks 
later,  on  the  11th  of  November,  he  made  an  extcmpoi^e 
speech  at  a  "  Faneuil  Hall  Rally "  of  the  Whigs  of 
Boston,  in  opposition  to  the  proposed  new  State  Con- 
stitution.^ On  the  29th  of  the  last-named  month  he  de- 
livered, by  request  of  the  Massachusetts  Charitable 
Mechanic  Association,  the  opening  lecture  of  a  course 
of  lectures  upon  the  Application  of  Science  to  Art, 
entitling  it  "  Archimedes  and  Franklin."  Towards  the 
close  of  it  he  strongly  urged  the  erection  of  a  statue  of 
Benjamin  Franklin  in  the  place  of  his  birth,  an  appeal 
which  resulted  in  the  existing  statue  in  front  of  the 
City  Hall,  with  the  design  and  execution  of  which  Mr. 
Winthrop  had  much  to  do,  and  the  address  at  the  un- 
veiling of  which  was  pronounced  by  him  on  the  17th  of 
September,  1856.^ 

On  the  21st  of  December,  1853,  he  delivered,  before 
the  Mercantile  Library  Association  of  Boston,  a  lecture 
upon  Algernon  Sidney,  one  of  his  favorite  characters  in 
history ;  and  on  the  23d  of  February,  1854,  he  made  in 
Faneuil  Hall,  at  short  notice,  a  speech  on  the  Repeal  of 

^  The  state  of  his  health  had  obliged  him  to  decline  serving  as  a  dele- 
g9,te  to  the  Constitutional  Convention. 

2  A  former  benefactor  of  this  Society,  Thomas  Dowse,  so  greatly  ad- 
mired this  lecture  of  Mr.  Winthrop's,  that  he  forthwith  proceeded  to 
put  up  at  his  own  expense  a  monument  to  Franklin  in  Mount  Auburn 
Cemetery. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  165 

the   Missouri  Compromise,  earnestly  deprecating  wliat 
he  considered  the  wanton  violation  of  that  compact. 

[Oct.  14,  1853.]  Thanks  for  your  compliments  about  my 
Fitchburg  speech.  It  is,  however,  one  of  the  last  flickerings 
of  an  expiring  flame.  '  I  know  not  where  is  that  Promethean 
fire  that  can  that  light  relume,'  and  I  may  add  that,  if  I  did 
know,  I  should  hesitate  before  applying  the  match.  So  far  as 
many  of  the  Boston  delegation  were  concerned,  my  success  was 
wrung  from  reluctant  ears.  Conscience-Whig  and  Free-Soil 
attacks  were  bad  enough,  but  they  were  open ;  the  whispered 
insinuations  of  some  of  the  Webster  clique  are  less  endurable. 
They  seem  to  consider  injustice  to  me  the  only  acceptable 
offering  to  the  manes  of  their  great  idol.  By  the  way,  apro- 
pos of  Free-Soilers,  only  think  of  John  P.  Hale  's  preparing 
his  last  evening's  speech  in  my  library.  He  could  find  a  full 
set  of  the  '  Congressional  Globe  '  nowhere  else.  My  sense  of 
hospitality  prevented  me  from  hinting  to  him  that  I  thought 
I  had  better  deserved  a  medal  than  he  for  efforts  for 
Colored  Seamen. 

[Feb.  24,  1854.]  I  was  somewhat  reluctant  to  take  part 
in  yesterday's  meeting,  and  only  consented  on  the  ex]Dress 
understanding  that  doubtful  points  were  to  be  avoided.  Some 
of  the  speakers  were  disposed  to  glorify  the  Compromise  of 
1850,  and  I  was  forced  to  put  in  a  caveat.  You  would  have 
been  edified  if  you  had  heard  the  applause  when  I  alluded  to 
my  own  course.  Douglas  has  done  a  foolish  thing,  and  it 
looks  to  me  as  if  a  black  squall  of  the  worst  kind  was  coming 
up,  which  will,  to  say  the  least,  throw  a  cloud  over  some 
presidential  prospects.  The  only  hope  of  doing  anything  is 
by  a  moderate  and  conciliatory  tone.  Seward's  speech  is  able 
and  discreet.  Sumner's  has,  to  my  mind,  so  much  tinsel  and 
tawdry  rhetoric  that  I  have  not  yet  waded  through  it,  but 
there  is  unquestionably  matter  in  it.  If  James  A.  Pearce 
could  have  seen  his  way  clear  to  vindicate  adherence  to  the 
Missouri  Compromise  (which  seems  to  me  little  more  than 


166  A  MEMOIR   OF 

the  dictate  of  common  honesty)  he  would  take  a  stand  at 
the  North  such  as  no  other  Southern  man  has  enjoyed.  I 
have  no  belief  that  slavery  will  make  much  headway  in  Kansas 
or  Nebraska.  But  antislavery  will  make  a  prodigious  head- 
way in  New  England  if  such  unwarrantable  glosses  are  to 
prevail  as  to  the  construction  of  the  Compromises  of  1850. 
If  I  could  have  prescribed  a  recipe  for  reinfiating  Free-Soilism 
and  Abolitionism,  which  had  collapsed  all  over  the  country, 
I  should  have  singled  out  this  precise  potion  from  the  whole 
materia  medica  of  political  quackery. 

[April  24.]  I  was  the  sole  representative  of  the  old  mess  at 
John  Davis's  funeral.  There  was  a  lamentable  lack  of  attend- 
ance from  Boston,  and  the  Legislature  treated  it  with  scant 
courtesy.  He  was  an  able,  faithful,  disinterested  public 
servant,  not  wanting  in  sagacity  and  shrewdness,  but  with 
that  sort  of  wisdom  which  the  good  book  says  '  dwells  with 
prudence.'  Twenty  years  ago  I  was  his  aide-de-camp,  and  I 
was  many  years  in  Congress  with  him,  where  his  sluggish 
temperament  and  seeming  timidity  sometimes  disturbed  me. 
Yet  I  believe  that  seeming  timidity  is  often  real  boldness, 
and  that  his  backwardness  was  the  mere  fault  of  his  blood.  He 
was  a  thoroughly  honest  man,  and,  upon  the  whole,  I  look 
back  on  his  career  and  character  with  great  respect  and  al- 
most reverence,  regarding  him  as  inferior  to  fcAV  of  our  Mas- 
sachusetts worthies  of  this  century.  His  example  was  always 
good,  and  that  gave  effect  to  his  precepts.  There  was  a  har- 
mony between  his  words  and  works,  and  both  were  pure  and 
patriotic. 

[May  16.]  Everett  is  looking  wretchedly.  When  he  told 
me  privately  of  his  contemplated  resignation  I  remonstrated 
against  his  taking  this  step  unless  he  really  felt  too  ill  to 
attend  to  his  duties.  Since  then  Abbott  Lawrence  has  been 
here  to  say  on  behalf  of  the  governor,^  that  if  I  would  take 
Everett's  place  in  the  Senate,  he  would  make  out  my  com- 

^  Our  former  associate,  Emory  Washburn,  was  then  governor. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  167 

mission  forthwith.  I  declined  with  thanks,  but  Lawrence 
presented  so  many  reasons  in  favor  of  my  going  that  I  con- 
sented to  take  a  day  or  two  to  consider  it,  and  consulted 
Nathan  and  William  Appleton,  as  well  as  Ephraim  Peabody. 
The  upshot  was  that  my  original  decision  was  not  shaken. 
Indeed,  I  feel  even  less  disposed  for  the  post  now  than  when 
I  withdrew  my  candidacy  in  January  of  last  year.  Had  I 
then  been  willing,  I  should  have  had  the  sanction  of  the 
Legislature  and  could  have  stayed  in  Washington  as  many 
years  of  the  full  term  as  I  might  see  fit.  Were  I  now  to  go, 
I  should  be  but  a  gubernatorial  nominee  for  some  eight 
months,  with  great  uncertainty  of  being  confirmed  in  the  end. 
Moreover,  I  should  go  on  when  the  battle  is  raging,  in  one  of 
the  hottest  months  of  the  summer,  and  with  an  obligation  to 
meet  the  requisitions  of  an  imperious  and  impatient  public 
sentiment  in  regard  to  Nebraska,  Cuba,  and  I  know  not  what 
all.  I  doubt  whether  my  health  is  strong  enough  for  plun- 
ging into  that  Washington  furnace  and  going  through  the 
rough  and  tumble  of  an  exciting  midsummer  session,  but  I 
should  be  willing  to  risk  it  if  I  could  really  see  a  chance  of 
doing  anything  effective  in  a  good  cause.  I  am  satisfied, 
however,  that  neither  votes  nor  voices  can  prevail  against  the 
foregone  conclusions  of  presidential  behests  and  party  sub- 
serviency. If  I  were  already  there  and  in  the  seat,  I  should 
feel  called  on  to  stay  and  bide  my  fortune,  but  to  go  on  vol- 
untarily under  such  circumstances  is  more  than  I  can  bring 
my  mind  to.  If  Everett  cannot  be  persuaded  to  reconsider 
and  go  back,  what  is  to  be  done  ?  My  own  opinion  is  that, 
in  such  case,  it  would  be  best  to  select  some  man  out  of 
Boston  —  some  one  who  might  not  care  to  run  next  winter  — 
say,  for  instance,  Briggs  (if  he  would  take  it),  Levi  Lincoln, 
Charles  Hudson,  Grinnell,  or  Julius  Rockwell,  —  all  good 
men  and  true. 

A  few  months  later  Mr.  Winthrop  received  a  very  dif- 
ferent offer,  and  one  which  much  astonished  him.    Early 


168  A  MEMOIR  OF 

in  September  he  was  privately  waited  on  by  four  persons 
of  apparent  respectability,  none  of  whom  he  could  re- 
member to  have  met  before,  who  represented  themselves 
as  empowered  by  the  Massachusetts  branch  of  the  new 
"Know  Nothing  Order"  to  propose  that,  if  he  would 
consent  to  a  private  initiation  into  one  of  their  "  Lodges," 
he  should  be  guaranteed  the  leadership  of  their  party 
in  the  State,  an  election  for  governor  in  November,  with 
the  reversion  of  a  Senator  ship.  He  at  first  suspected 
some  mystification,  but  becoming  satisfied  that  the  over- 
tures were  bona  fide,  he  politely  declined  them,  primarily 
on  the  ground  that,  from  the  very  outset  of  his  career, 
he  had  been  opposed  to  secret  political  organizations, 
especially  when  based  upon  religion  or  race  ;  but  adding 
that  although  defeated  for  governor  and  senator  in 
1851,  he  had  since  good  reason  to  consider  both  offices 
to  have  been  within  his  reach,  and  had  therefore  no 
disposition  at  this  late  day  to  join  a  new  party  in  order 
to  obtain  them. 

I  wonder  [he  subsequently  wrote]  how  much  authority 
these  mysterious  visitants  really  had  and  how  far  they  were 
in  a  position  to  carry  out  their  promises.  If  it  be  true  that 
they  have  enlisted  Wilson,  they  are  not  unlikely  to  become  a 
power.  He  is  far  too  shrewd  to  allow  himself  to  be  made  a 
catspaw.^ 

Among  a  variety  of  non-political  speeches  made  by 
him  about  this  time,  an  address  at  the  semi-centennial 
celebration  of  the  New  York  Historical  Society,  Nov.  20, 

^  It  is  perhaps  unnecessary  to  mention  that  the  Know-Nothing  party 
swept  Massachusetts  in  November,  1854,  not  merely  electing  their  candi- 
dates for  State  offices,  but  sending  Henry  Wilson  to  the  United  States 
Senate  in  the  following  winter. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  169 

1854,  and  one  at  the  laying  of  the  corner-stone  of  the 
Pubhc  Library  of  Boston,  Sept.  17,  1855,  may  be  alluded 
to  in  passing.  He  had  been  one  of  the  earliest  con- 
tributors of  books  to  the  last-named,  and  had  consented, 
with  some  hesitation,  to  serve  as  chairman  of  a  Board 
of  Commissioners  to  erect  a  suitable  building,  a  matter 
which  occupied  him  a  good  deal  for  several  years ;  and 
although  the  architect  selected  by  a  majority  of  his 
colleagues  was  not  the  one  he  preferred,  and  the  edifice 
when  completed  was  not  wholly  to  his  taste,  yet  he 
quite  enjoyed  these  unaccustomed  duties,  finding  that 
they  brought  him  into  contact  with  persons  he  might 
not  otherwise  have  known,  several  of  whom  he  remem- 
bered with  much  pleasure  in  later  life.  He  was  then  also 
serving  a  term  as  an  Overseer  of  Harvard,  and  an  elabo- 
rate Report  made  by  him  on  the  establishment  of  the 
Plummer  Professorship  of  Christian  Morals  and  the 
office  of  Preacher  to  the  University  was  printed  in  1855. 
In  it  he  took  occasion  to  emphasize  his  belief  that  "  the 
worship  of  God  is  the  first  thing,  and  not  the  last  thing, 
to  be  provided  for  in  a  great  seminary  of  learning ;  and 
the  religious  instructions  of  the  Sabbath  as  much  a 
part  of  any  true  system  of  education  as  the  recitations 
and  lectures  of  the  week-day."  In  1854  he  was  elected 
president  of  the  Boston  Provident  Association,  which 
had  been  founded,  three  years  before,  with  a  view  of 
systematizing  the  charities  of  the  city,  and  of  endeavor- 
ing, by  means  of  careful  investigation,  complete  registra- 
tion, and  co-operation  with  other  agencies,  to  prevent 
private  liberality  from  being  misapplied.  This  led  him 
to  accept,  some  years  later,  the  laborious  post  of  Chair- 
man of  the  Board  of  Overseers  of  the  Poor  of  Boston, 


170  A  MEMOIR  OF 

which  he  held  a  long  time,  taking  a  very  active  part  in 
the  administration  and  partial  reorganization  of  that 
department  of  our  municipal  system.  In  April,  1855, 
he  became  president  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical 
Society,  of  which  he  had  been  elected  a  resident  member 
so  far  back  as  1839,  and  in  which,  from  the  first,  he  took 
a  peculiar  interest,  partly  because  it  is  the  oldest  institu- 
tion of  its  kind  in  this  country,  partly  because  his  father 
long  presided  over  it,  and  partly  because  he  considered 
its  publications  invaluable  to  students  of  New  England 
history.  Its  senior  member  at  the  present  day  did  not 
enter  the  Society  until  nearly  five  years  after  Mr.  Win- 
throp  assumed  the  presidency,  and  our  published  pro- 
ceedings are  all  that  is  left  to  bear  testimony  to  the 
untiring  diligence  then  displayed  by  him  in  improving 
the  comfort  of  our  surroundings,  in  promoting  a  more 
careful  supervision  of  our  books  and  manuscripts,  in 
instilling  new  life  into  our  meetings,  and  in  gradually 
obtaining  increased  resources  for  our  work. 

After  describing  the  breaking  up  of  the  Know-Nothing 
party,  as  a  national  organization,  in  the  summer  of 
1855,  Henry  Wilson  goes  on  to  say  :  — 

"  On  the  adoption  of  the  Southern  platform  a  conference 
was  held  between  Mr.  Wilson,  Mr.  Bowles  of  the  '  Springfield 
Republican,'  and  Col.  Ezra  Lincoln.  Mr.  Bowles  had  been 
an  earnest  and  effective  Whig ;  but  he  understood  the  pur- 
poses of  those  who  had  disrupted  the  American  party,  and 
was  ready  to  unite  with  them  in  forming  a  party  of  freedom. 
Colonel  Lincoln  had  been,  too,  one  of  the  most  earnest  and 
sagacious  leaders  of  the  Whig  party  in  Massachusetts.  It 
was  his  judgment  that  the  time  had  arrived  for  disbanding  it, 
and  for  the  formation  of  a  new  party,  not  only  in  Massachu- 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  171 

setts,  but  throughout  the  country,  on  the  basis  of  the  Repub- 
lican platform.  Fully  according  in  the  sentiment  as  expressed 
by  Mr.  Wilson,  that  the  time  had  come  for  combining  the  few 
thousand  avowed  Republicans,  the  anti-Nebraska  Democrats, 
and  antislavery  '  Americans,'  and  that  all  that  was  necessary 
was  for  the  Whigs  to  unite  in  the  movement  to  control  the 
policy  of  the  State,  they  agreed  that  Mr.  Winthrop  was  the 
man  to  take  the  lead  in  such  an  effort.  Mr.  Wilson  urged 
these  gentlemen  to  hasten  home,  see  Mr.  Winthrop,  and  urge 
upon  him  the  necessity  of  prompt  action.  '  Tell  him,'  said 
Mr.  Wilson,  '  that  we  antislavery  men  want  him  and  his 
friends  to  take  the  lead  in  forming  a  victorious  Republican 
party  in  Massachusetts,  that  we  are  ready  to  make  any  sacri- 
fices for  the  cause  of  freedom,  that  we  will  go  into  the  ranks 
and  work  for  victory,  and  that  he  and  others  may  win  and 
wear  the  honors  of  success.'  But,  though  pressed  to  do  so, 
Mr.  Winthrop  declined  to  join  the  movement  proposed."  ^ 

In  a  letter  to  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  dated  Amesbury, 
July  3,  1854,  John  G.  Whit  tier  had  written :  — 

"The  circular  signed  by  thyself  and  others  has  just  reached 
me.  Your  movement  I  regard  as  every  way  timely  and  ex- 
pedient. I  have  been  for  some  time  past  engaged  in  efforts 
tending  to  the  same  object,  —  the  consolidation  of  the  anti- 
slavery  sentiment  of  the  North.  For  myself,  I  have  nothing 
for  names ;  I  have  no  prejudices  against  Whig  or  Democrat, 
and  am  more  than  willing  to  take  the  humblest  place  in  a 
new  organization  made  up  from  Whigs,  anti-Nebraska  Demo- 
crats, and  Free-Soilers.  The  great  body  of  the  people  here 
are  ready  to  unite  in  the  formation  of  such  a  party.  The 
Whigs  especially  only  wait  for  the  movement  of  the  men  to 
whom  they  have  been  accustomed  to  look  for  direction.  I 
may  be  mistaken,  but  I  fully  believe  that  Robert  C.  Winthrop 
holds  in  his  hands  the  destiny  of  the  North.      By  throwing 

1  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power,  vol.  ii.  p.  433. 


172  A  MEMOIR  OF 

himself  on  the  side  of  this  movement  he  could  carry  with 
him  the  Whig  strength  of  New  England."  ^ 

Mr.  Winthrop  had  known  Whittier  as  far  back  as 
when  the  latter  was  a  Henry  Clay  Whig,  and  had  now 
and  then  received  letters  from  him  expressing  approval 
of  particular  speeches.  The  result  was  that,  in  spite 
of  wdde  differences  of  political  opinion,  a  friendly  feel- 
ing still  existed  between  them,  and  in  a  letter  to  Mr. 
Winthrop  in  the  summer  of  1855,  Whittier  had  urged 
and  amplified  the  views  expressed  in  the  above  letter  to 
Emerson.  Similar  appeals  came  to  Mr.  Winthrop  from 
other  sources,  but  he  was  unable  to  comply  with  them 
without  doing  violence  to  his  convictions.  His  views  on 
the  subject  are  best  expressed  in  his  well-known  letter 
on  the  "  Fusion  of  Parties,"  the  whole  of  which  is  to  be 
found  in  the  second  volume  of  his  collected  works,  and 
from  which  I  here  quote  a  few  passages  :  — 

I  have  no  slavish  devotion  to  party  lines  or  party  names. 
Who  cares  whether  the  organization  under  which  we  act  be 
entitled  Whig  or  Republican  ?  Why,  it  can  hardly  be  forgot- 
ten that  most  of  us  were  Republicans  before  we  were  Whigs. 
National  Republicans^  —  that  was  the  old  name  of  the  Whig 
party.  I  trust  there  is  not  more  meant  than  meets  the  ear, 
in  the  proposal  to  omit  the  first  half  of  that  old  name.  I 
trust  that  we  shall  go  for  the  whole  or  none,  and  that  we 
shall  insist  on  being  nothing  less  than  National  Republicans 
in  fact,  whatever  we  may  suffer  ourselves  to  be  entitled.  I 
can  see  no  advantage,  however,  in  changing  names,  unless 
there  is  to  be  some  substantial  change  of  policy  or  principle. 
The  mere  addition  of  another  alias  confers  no  honor  upon 
individuals  or  parties,  and  does  nothing  to  increase  the  confi- 

^  Life  and  Letters  of  John  Greenleaf  Whittier,  by  S.  T.  Pickard, 
vol.  i.  p.  374. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  173 

dence  with  which  they  are  regarded  by  the  community.  What 
substantial  change,  then,  of  principle  or  of  policy  is  the  Whig 
party  of  Massachusetts  called  on  to  adopt,  or  what  change 
are  they  ready  to  adopt,  even  if  they  are  called  on  ? 

I  am  not  about  to  aver  that  the  course  of  the  Whig  party 
has  always  been  the  very  wisest,  discreetest,  and  best,  which 
could  possibly  have  been  pursued.  The  time  has  been  — 
more  than  once,  perhaps  —  when  I  could  have  desired  some 
material  modification  of  that  course.  But  take  it  for  all  in 
all,  —  in  the  general  direction  it  has  pursued,  and  in  the 
general  results  it  has  accomplished,  —  what  party  has  existed 
in  our  day  and  generation  which  has  been  more  pure,  more 
patriotic,  more  faithful  to  the  best  interests  of  the  country 
and  the  true  principles  of  the  Constitution  ?  What  party  has 
ever  included  on  its  rolls  and  within  its  ranks  a  larger 
number  of  the  most  enlightened  and  devoted  friends  and  de- 
fenders of  our  republic  and  its  institutions  ?  I  know  of  none. 
I  understand  by  the  Whig  party  of  Massachusetts,  in  the  first 
place,  a  Constitutional  party,  —  which  regards  the  Union 
of  the  States,  and  the  Constitution  which  is  the  formal  con- 
dition and  bond  of  that  Union,  as  things  —  above  all  other 
things  —  to  be  respected  and  maintained.  I  understand  it  to 
be  a  party  which,  while  it  may  perceive  some  provisions  of 
that  Constitution  which  it  might  wish  to  have  been  other 
than  they  are,  yet  recognizes  and  accepts  the  whole,  every 
article  of  it,  as  of  binding  force  and  obligation,  —  and  that 
not  according  to  any  arbitrary  individual  understanding,  but 
according  to  solemn  judicial  interpretation,  —  which  justifies 
no  revocation,  equivocation,  or  evasion  in  the  official  oath  to 
support  that  Constitution,  but  demands  the  exact  and  scrupu- 
lous fulfilment  of  that  oath  by  all  who  are  privileged  to  take 
it  on  their  lips.  I  understand  by  the  Whig  party  of  Massa- 
chusetts, in  the  second  place,  a  party  of  Law  and  Order,  — 
which  seeks  reforms  by  no  riotous  or  revolutionary  processes, 
—  which  regards  the  great  right  of  revolution  as  having  been, 
once  for  all,  asserted,  and  the  great  work  of  revolution,  once 


174  A  MEMOIR  OF 

for  all,  accomplished,  by  those  who  have  gone  before  us ;  and 
which  looks  henceforward,  for  the  redress  of  occasional  griev- 
ances, to  the  peaceful  and  legitimate  operation  of  the  repub- 
lican institutions  which  they  founded;  which  holds  all 
nullification  and  disunion  in  utter  abhorrence,  and  disclaims 
all  sympathy  with  those  who  would  burn  constitutions  and 
batter  down  courthouses.  I  understand  by  the  Whig  party 
of  Massachusetts,  in  the  third  place,  a  party  which  consents 
to  no  bargain,  and  tolerates  no  traffic,  as  a  means  of  securing 
office ;  which  abominates  all  political  trading  and  huckstering, 
whether  for  the  promotion  of  measures  or  of  men ;  and  which 
looks  with  common  aversion  upon  the  congenial  corruption 
which  purchased  a  coalition  triumph  in  the  Legislature  of 
Massachusetts,  or  a  Nebraska  triumph  in  the  Congress  of  the 
United  States.  I  understand  by  the  Whig  party  of  Massa- 
chusetts, in  the  fourth  place,  a  party  which  looks  to  the  ad- 
vancement of  our  national  prosperity  and  welfare,  by  a  liberal 
administration  of  the  public  lands,  by  a  discriminating  adjust- 
ment and  an  honest  and  equal  collection  of  the  duties  upon 
imports,  and  by  seasonable  and  sufficient  appropriations  for 
the  improvement  of  rivers  and  harbors.  I  understand  by  the 
Whig  party  of  Massachusetts,  in  the  fifth  place,  a  party  which 
has  adopted  and  pursued  the  true  Washington  policy  of 
observing  good  faith  and  justice  towards  all  nations,  and  of 
cultivating  peace  and  harmony  with  all ;  which  would  avoid 
all  permanent  antipathies  and  passionate  attachments  for 
other  countries,  and  which,  contenting  itself  with  the  vastness 
of  our  own  territories,  is  opposed  to  every  lawless  scheme  of 
foreign  encroachment  and  aggrandizement.  I  understand  by 
the  Whig  party  of  Massachusetts,  in  the  sixth  place,  a  party 
which  demands  the  maintenance  of  equal  representation  and 
of  an  independent  judiciary  in  our  own  Commonwealth,  and 
which  resists  all  tampering  with  our  State  Constitution  for 
the  purpose  of  breaking  down  the  barriers  of  justice,  or  of 
transferring  the  legislative  power  of  the  State  from  the  many 
to  the  few.     And,  finally,  I  understand  by  the  W^hig  party  of 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  175 

Massachusetts  a  party  which  deplores  the  existence  of  domes- 
tic slavery  within  the  limits  of  the  American  Union  or  any- 
where else  on  the  face  of  the  globe  ;  which,  while  it  abstains 
from  all  unconstitutional  and  illegal  interference  with  it 
whatever,  would  omit  no  legal  effort  to  arrest  and  prevent  its 
extension ;  which  would  rejoice  to  co-operate  in  any  practi- 
cable method  for  its  gradual  and  ultimate  extinction,  and  to 
bear  its  share  in  any  pecuniary  sacrifices  this  might  involve ; 
which  stands  ready  to  resist  any  encroacjiment  and  aggression 
upon  Northern  rights;  and  which  especially  condemns  and 
protests  against  the  recent  repudiation  of  the  Missouri  restric- 
tion and  the  reopening  to  slavery  of  a  territory  consecrated 
to  freedom. 

This  is  what  I  understand  the  Whig  party  of  Massachu- 
setts to  have  been,  and  still  to  be.  And  what  is  there  in  the 
present  condition  of  public  affairs  which  calls  upon  us  to 
abandon  such  a  party,  and  to  enlist  under  the  recruiting  flag 
of  a  new  one  ?  As  to  the  poor  pretence  that  the  Whig  party 
is  dead,  it  has  been  dealt  with  sufficiently  by  others.  It  is 
the  old  story  of  the  profligate  prince  who  stole  the  crown  from 
the  pillow  of  his  royal  parent  to  place  it  prematurely  on  his 
own  brow,  and  of  whom  it  was  so  well  said  that  his  wish  was 
only  father  to  the  thought.  .  .  .  For  myself,  I  do  not  hesitate 
to  agree  with  the  late  Whig  Convention  that  the  greatest 
evils  which  the  people  of  Massachusetts  are  at  this  moment 
called  on  to  redress  and  remedy  are  those  within  their  own 
immediate  limits.  To  redeem  this  ancient  Commonwealth 
from  the  disgrace  with  which  she  has  been  covered,  to  lift  her 
up  from  the  mire  into  which  corrupt  and  huckstering  poli- 
ticians have  plunged  her,  to  erase  from  her  records  at  least 
one  act  in  direct  and  wanton  violation  of  her  constitutional 
obligations,  and  to  replace  her  on  that  lofty  eminence  on  which 
she  so  long  stood,  —  this  is  the  first  duty  of  every  true  Massa- 
chusetts man.  I  cannot  think  this  is  to  be  done  by  the  re- 
election of  one  half  of  the  candidates  of  the  very  persons  who 
have  assisted  in  her  degradation.     I  cannot  think  it  is  to  be 


176  A  MEMOIR  OF 

done  by  the  success  of  those  who  have  openly  proclaimed 
that  no  conformity  is  to  be  required  upon  this  point,  who 
have  wholly  omitted  all  allusion  to  it  in  their  platform,  and 
who  have  selected  an  entirely  different  and  remote  issue  as 
the  paramount  and  only  issue  for  their  consideration.  Talk 
of  omissions  at  this  convention  or  that !  What  omission  is  so 
glaring  and  so  monstrous  as  that  which  has  ignored  the  whole 
condition  and  policy  of  our  State  government  at  a  moment 
when  these  alone  are  the  direct  subject  of  our  struggle,  — 
when  there  is  really  no  other  '  practical  and  living  issue ' 
before  us.  I  freely  confess  that  I  need  no  other  inducement 
than  this  for  adhering  to  the  party  with  which  I  have  been  so 
long  associated ;  a  party  which  has  ever  been  faithful  to  thq 
honor  and  welfare  of  Massachusetts,  and  under  whose  auspices 
she  first  won  that  proud  and  pre-eminent  title,  at  home  and 
abroad,  —  already  forfeited,  I  fear, — of  '  the  model  State '  of  the 
American  Union.  If  that  title  is  ever  to  be  regained,  it  will 
be  under  something  less  speckled  and  motley  than  a  Fusion 
flag.  If  the  good  old  bark  is  once  more  to  be  the  pride  of  the 
seas,  or  the  blessing  of  the  Baj^,  she  must  put  in  for  repairs 
to  something  safer  and  better  than  a  sectional,  floating 
dock.  .  .  . 

But  we  are  urged  to  abandon  our  old  colors,  and  rush 
wildly  into  the  promiscuous  ranks  of  a  one-idea  party,  in  order 
to  promote  some  grand  result  connected  with  human  liberty. 
Let  us  look  at  the  new  party  for  a  single  moment  in  this  par- 
ticular light,  and  see  what  claims  it  has  to  our  confidence. 
Beyond  all  doubt,  a  great  and  grievous  wrong  was  perpetrated 
by  the  passage  of  the  Nebraska  Bill.  I  united  with  others  in 
protesting  against  it  at  the  outset,  and  I  have  no  words  of 
palliation  or  apology  for  it  now.  It  was  an  act  of  a  character 
to  put  '  toys  of  desperation '  into  all  our  brains,  to  tempt  us 
for  the  moment  to  break  from  all  our  old  relations  and  to 
plunge  into  any  policy  which  might  hold  out  ever  so  delusive 
a  hope  of  redress.  But  a  sober  second  thought  may  lead  us 
to  inquire,  What  more  can  the  Whigs  of  Massachusetts  do  on 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  177 

that  subject  than  they  have  done  already?  Their  representa- 
tives opposed  it  at  every  stage  of  its  progress  by  argument 
and  by  vote,  while  the  very  men  who  are  now  clamoring  most 
loudly  for  their  aid  and  alliance  manifested  their  appreciation 
of  such  fidelity  by  lying  in  wait  to  undermine  and  overthrow 
them  at  the  earliest  moment.  .  .  .  And  this  brings  me  to  my 
principal  objection  to  the  new  party,  and  that  is,  its  eminent 
adaptation  to  defeat  the  very  ends  at  which  it  professedly 
aims.  I  am  one  of  those  who  believe  that  the  ultraism  and 
recklessness  of  some  of  these  old  Free-Soil  leaders,  who  are 
now  calling  on  the  whole  people  to  sustain  them  in  the  offices 
which  they  have  gained  by  every  degree  of  indirection  and 
indecency,  have  been  the  occasion  of  not  a  few  of  those  very 
aggressions  which  they  are  so  vociferous  in  condemning,  and 
are  destined  to  be  the  occasion  of  still  new  ones,  if  they  are 
to  be  encouraged  and  strengthened  in  their  fanatical  career. 
No  class  of  men  in  the  country,  either  Northern  or  Southern, 
have,  in  my  judgment,  been  more  responsible  for  many  of  the 
measures  which  they  have  been  loudest  in  denouncing,  than 
your  regular  Northern  agitators,  who  have  at  last  alarmed  the 
South  into  an  idea  of  the  absolute  necessity  of  strengthening 
herself  for  the  protection  of  her  domestic  institutions.  Some- 
times we  know  that  the  South  has  received  the  most  direct 
and  positive  aid  from  this  source.  Nobody  doubts  that  Texas 
was  brought  into  the  Union  through  the  instrumentality  of 
New  York  Free-Soilers,  at  least  one  of  whom  may  be  found  at 
this  moment  among  the  leading  Republican  candidates  in  that 
State.  Even  the  Nebraska  Bill  owed  not  a  little  of  its  success, 
in  my  opinion,  to  the  fatuity  of  some  of  these  ultra  men. 
The  violence  to  which  they  resorted,  here  and  elsewhere,  but 
particularly  here,  in  resisting  the  Fugitive-Slave  Law,  pro- 
duced the  impression  that  the  North  intended  to  keep  no  faith 
on  any  point.  And  when  at  length  this  Nebraska  Bill  was 
introduced,  a  handful  of  them  precipitated  themselves  into 
the  front  ranks  of  the  opposition,  in  a  way  to  drive  off  the 
only  persons  who  could  have  prevented  its  consummation. 

12 


178  A  MEMOIR   OF 

They  usurped  a  lead  which  belonged  to  others  and  gave  an 
odor  of  abolition  to  the  whole  movement.     From  the  moment 
I  read  their  ill-advised  manifesto,  I  despaired  of  seeing  that 
Southern  opposition  to  the  measure  which,  under  other  cir- 
cumstances, I  fully  and  firmly  believe  we  should  have  ob- 
tained. ...  It  is  not  enough  considered  that  the  real  retarders 
of  any  movement  are  often  found  among  those  who  are  claim- 
ing to  be  its  leaders.     Has  it  not  been  so  in  the  case  of  Tem- 
perance ?     Has  not  excessive  zeal  and  blind  one-ideaism  led 
at  last  to  the  enactment  of  laws  which  have  created  a  general 
reaction  and  put  back  the  cause  of  Temperance  ?     Just  so  it 
has  been,  and  will  be  again,  with  these  ultraists  in  the  cause 
of  freedom.     For  one,  I  never  witness  one  of  their  violent 
spasmodic  agitations  about  slavery  at  the  North  without  look- 
ing to  see  it  followed  by  some  fresh  triumph  at  the  South.  .  .  . 
We  had  a  grand  rising  about  Texas,  I  remember,  after  it  was 
irreparably  annexed,  and  now  we  are  to  have  a  grand  rally 
about  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  restriction,  after  it  is  hope- 
lessly accomplished.      And  while  we  are  thus  engaged,  the 
South  will  be  looking  about  them  for  some  fresh  chances  of 
fortifying  their  institutions.    Our  ultraists  will  have  succeeded 
in  nothing  but  in  alarming  them  afresh  into  a  feeling  that 
some  new  defences  must  be  secured.    They  will  have  alienated 
and  disgusted  all  the  moderate  and  reasonable  men  among 
them  and  among  ourselves ;  and  with  the  aid  of  the  Democ- 
racy, some  fresh  annexation  of  new  territory,  or  some  other 
repeal,  if  anything  remains  to  be  repealed,  of  the  restrictions 
upon  old  territory,  will  be  successfully  attempted.    Geographi- 
cal parties  will  have  been  arrayed  against  each  other,  and 
thus  the  action  and  reaction  of  ultraism  at  both  ends  of  the 
Union  will  go  on  to  the  end  of  the  chapter,  involving  us  in  a 
never-ceasing  series  of  mischievous  and  deplorable  measures. 
And  to  this  end  we  are  called  on  to  forget  the  past,  to  disre- 
gard all  experience,  and  to  rush  into  the  formation  of  what 
has  been  elegantly  denominated  a  great  'Backbone  Party.' 
No :  the  vertebral  column  must  support  a  sounder  brain  be- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  179 

fore  I  can  desire  to  see  it  assuming  anything  of  additional 
strength  and  solidity.  Better  let  it  remain  as  fragmentary 
and  lleshless  as  that  of  some  fossil  reptile  of  the  coal  meas- 
ures, if  it  is  only  to  be  employed  as  an  instrument  for  disjoint- 
ing the  carefully  compacted  framework  of  our  national  body 
politic,  or  if  it  is  forever  to  serve  as  a  bone  of  contention 
among  those  who  ought  to  be  able  to  live  together  in  harmony 
and  concord.  One  thing  I  long  ago  resolved  on  in  my  own 
political  career,  and  that  is,  never  to  give  countenance  or  sup- 
port to  any  policy  or  any  party  which  tends  in  my  conscientious 
conviction  towards  disorganization  or  disunion. 

.  o  .  Let  me  only  add,  that  I  am  not  ready  to  concur  with 
any  expressions  of  disparagement  or  contempt  which  the  heat 
of  debate  may  have  elicited  from  anybody  for  those  old  friends 
of  ours  who  have  parted  from  us  somewhat  suddenly  and  un- 
expectedly. I  regret  the  loss  of  every  man  of  them,  and  I 
heartily  wish  they  were  all  back  again  among  us  to  help  us 
in  our  future  struggles.  There  are  many  of  them  with  whom 
I  have  agreed  better  about  some  things  than  I  have  with  those 
that  have  stayed  behind.  For  many  of  them  I  have  the 
warmest  personal  regard,  and  though  we  may  now  seem  to  be 
pursuing  different  and  divergent  paths,  I  earnestly  hope  and 
trust  we  shall  come  out,  one  of  these  days,  at  the  same  Grand 
Junction,  and  be  found  travelling  together  again  along  the 
same  old  national  highway. 

This  letter  elicited  warm  expressions  of  approval  from 
many  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  political  friends,  but  it  gave 
great  offence  to  his  opponents.  Some  idea  of  how  they 
felt  about  it  may  be  gathered  from  the  following  para- 
graph which  I  find  in  one  of  his  scrap-books,  and  which 
he  had  evidently  clipped  from  a  Free-Soil  newspaper  : 

"  As  Mr.  Robert  C.  Winthrop's  utterances  on  the  subject  of 
'  Fusion '  are  attracting  some  attention,  we  will  state,  for  the 
benefit  of  the  younger  class  of  our  political  readers,  that  he 


180  A  MEMOIR  OF 

was  formerly  a  Member  of  Congress,  and  was  elected  Speaker 
of  the  House.  He  was  an  excellent  presiding  officer  and  was 
also  somewhat  distinguished  as  a  debater.  He  was  lament- 
ably deficient,  however,  in  courage,  and,  having  dodged  behind 
one  of  the  pillars  of  the  Representative  Chamber  to  escape 
the  responsibility  of  a  vote  on  the  Wilmot  Proviso,  he  became 
unpopular  with  the  people  of  Massachusetts.  He  was  accord- 
ingly turned  out  of  the  United  States  Senate,  where  he  was 
filling  or  attempting  to  fill,  a  vacancy,  and  the  next  year  he 
was  badly  beaten  when  running  for  Governor.  By  general 
consent  he  has  since  that  time  been  kept  out  of  political  life. 
As  President  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society,  one  of 
the  principal  managers  of  the  Boston  Public  Library,  and  a 
speaker  upon  festive  occasions,  he  still,  however,  occupies  a 
creditable  position,  and  is  much  esteemed  by  his  fellow- 
citizens.  His  recent  letter  bears  the  unavoidable  tinge  of 
political  disappointment,  and  the  very  reprehensible  coloring 
of  political  hatred  and  revenge,  elements  of  his  character 
which  we  had  hoped  were  exorcised  by  his  long  political 
exile'." 

Further  extracts  from  Mr.  Winthrop's  private  letters 
here  follow  :  — 

[Nahant,  Aug.  23,  1855.]  We  buried  poor  Abbott  Law- 
rence yesterday.  His  counsel  would  have  been  worth  much 
in  this  exigency.  The  Fusion  is  in  full  progress,  but  I  have 
refused  to  have  any  part  or  lot  in  it.  Julius  Rockwell  has 
written  me  a  long  letter,  to  be  shown  to  discreet  friends,  with 
much  of  which  I  agree,  but  it  perhaps  lays  down  a  stiffer 
platform  than  I  should  care  to  be  responsible  for.  Washing- 
ton Hunt's  published  letter  is  a  good  thing,  and  expresses  my 
sentiments  better  than  any  of  the  manifestoes  of  the  day.  I 
told  Rockwell  I  thought  the  best  thing  a  Whig  convention 
coukl  do  would  be  to  nominate  him  for  Governor,  but  if  there 
is  an  Abolitionist  tail  to  his  kite  I  shall  bolt.  My  fear  is, 
that  instead  of  punishing  the  authors  of  the  Nebraska  outrage, 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  181 

we  are  preparing  the  way  for  their  renewed  triumph.  For 
myself,  I  would  make  any  sacrifice  but  that  of  honest  con- 
viction to  give  a  better  direction  to  the  public  counsels.  But 
what  can  be  done  by  a  man  who  feels  as  I  do  ?  I  voted  against 
the  Fugitive  Bill,  but  I  can  never  go  for  defeating  the  exe- 
cution of  it  by  forcible  resistance,  or  by  unconstitutional 
legislation.  I  deplore  the  passage  of  the  Nebraska  Act,  but 
I  honestly  believe  that  Northern  rashness  and  violence  have 
been  the  main  instruments  in  accomplishing  its  worst  results. 
I  am  for  resisting  the  aggressions  of  slavery,  but  I  cannot 
unite  in  taking  the  first  great  step  for  rending  the  Union  by 
the  formation  of  a  sectional  party. 

[Sept.  4.]  1  am  just  from  Cambridge,  where  I  have  been 
greatly  gratified  and  interested.  The  induction  of  Professor 
Huntingdon  was  most  impressive,  and  Dr.  Walker's  sermon 
admirable.  It  contained  a  quotation  from  my  Alumni  ad- 
dress, and  I  had  hardly  realized  the  nobleness  of  my  own 
sentence  until  I  heard  it  from  his  lips.  There  was  a  solemn 
earnestness  about  to-day's  services  which  made  one  feel  that 
souls  were  at  stake  and  eternity  the  issue.  It  made  me  feel, 
too,  that  if  any  word  I  had  spoken  or  written  had  suggested 
or  sustained  such  a  movement,  it  was  worth  all  the  other 
words  of  my  life.  I  wish  you  had  been  there  to  catch  the 
inspiration  and  to  conceive  new  hopes  of  the  College. 

[Nov.  23.]  Did  you  hear  that  I  was  unanimously  nomi- 
nated for  Mayor  of  Boston  by  the  '  Citizens'  Union,'  and  that 
I  unanimously  declined  ?  It  would  have  been  even  more  dis- 
tasteful to  me  than  the  presidency  of  Harvard,  for  which  some 
well-meaning  friends  continue  to  suggest  my  name.  I  am 
conscious  that  my  life  has  become  too  much  a  frittering  away 
of  time  in  petty  cares  and  laborious  trifles,  but  I  can  at  least 
avoid  duties  for  which  my  tastes  and  temperament  unfit  me.^ 

^  Mr.  Winthrop  had  twice  refused  to  be  one  of  the  Corporation  of 
the  University,  but  he  had  succeeded  Mr.  Everett  as  President  of  the 
Alumni  Association,  and  was  also  President  of  the  Harvard  Club  of 
Boston,  a  short-lived  institution,  now  almost  forgotten. 


182  A  MEMOIR   OF 

[June  7,  1856.]  My  long  silence  has  been  due  to  ill  health 
and  the  sickness  of  two  of  .my  children.  The  latter  are  con- 
valescent ;  but  as  I  continued  poorly,  I  decided  to  try  the 
effect  of  a  journey,  and  on  Saturday,  the  24th  ult.,  was  busy 
with  my  preparations  when  I  was  waylaid  about  noon  by  our 
worthy  friend,  Samuel  May,  with  a  request  from  the  com- 
mittee appointed  at  the  Theodore  Parker  and  Wendell  Phil- 
lips meeting  the  night  before  that  I  would  say  a  few  words 
at  Faneuil  Hall  that  evening.  I  told  him  that  nobody  con- 
demned the  assault  on  Sumner  more  unqualifiedly  than  I  did, 
but  that  the  state  of  my  health  would  render  it  impossible  for 
me  to  accept,  even  if  I  desired  to  do  so.  At  five  in  the  after- 
noon appeared  Judge  Russell,  accompanied  by  a  gentleman 
whose  name  I  did  not  catch.  The  Judge  said  he  was  not 
surprised  I  did  not  think  it  prudent  to  attend  the  meeting,  if 
I  supposed  it  were  to  be  a  continuation  of  that  of  the  night 
before  and  under  the  same  auspices,  but  that  he  wished  to  in- 
form me  the  Governor  was  to  preside,  and  that  Walley,  Hil- 
lard,  and  Chandler  were  to  speak.  I  replied  that  no  prudential 
considerations  had  entered  into  my  answer  to  Mr.  May,  though 
I  could  not  forget  that  Faneuil  Hall  meetings  were  not  always 
the  most  fortunate  things  in  times  of  excitement,  —  witness 
a  somewhat  recent  one  followed  by  an  assault  on  the  Court 
House  and  the  murder  of  an  officer ;  but  I  repeated  my  un- 
mitigated condemnation  of  the  attack  on  Sumner,  and  ex- 
pressed a  hope  the  present  meeting  would  be  so  conducted 
that  all  good  citizens  might  concur  in  its  proceedings.  About 
seven  in  the  evening  appeared  Charles  Hale,  who  earnestly  sug- 
gested that  it  would  be  both  graceful  and  politic  for  me  to  go 
to  Faneuil  Hall  and  express  sympathy  for  Sumner.  Again  I 
went  through  my  primary  and  conclusive  reasons,  but  Charles 
being  a  friend,  I  ventured  into  some  secondary  and  tertiary 
strata^  pointing  out  that  it  would  be  impossible  for  me  to  say 
all  that  the  existing  irritation  of  the  public  mind  required,  — 
that  I  could  not  indorse  Sumner's  general  course,  or  this  par- 
ticular speech  of  his,  and  that  any  qualifications  at  such  a 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  183 

moment  would  subject  me  to  imputations  of  willingness  to 
wound  an  injured  man  and  feed  an  ancient  grudge.  I  added, 
moreover,  my  regret  that  these  meetings  should  have  been 
hurried  along  with  such  precipitancy,  while  we  have  had  only 
telegraphic  accounts  of  what  occurred,  and  while  both  Senate, 
House,  and  Criminal  Courts  are  instituting  processes  to  give 
us  the  facts.  Monday  I  started  with  my  family  for  Saratoga, 
returning  here  by  way  of  New  York  a  week  later,  when  I 
found  a  note  from  Dr.  S.  G.  Howe  inviting  me  to  a  Kansas  agi- 
tation meeting  the  next  evening,  and  enclosing  a  note  from 
Walley  to  suggest  that  I  should  make  the  opening  speech. 
This  I  declined  to  do  in  an  elaborate  letter,  which  I  have  not 
yet  seen  in  print.  It  was  no  great  affair,  rather  solemn  and 
grandiose,  dealing  more  in  cautions  against  violence  than  in 
appeals  to  clap-trap,  and  deprecating  the  prevailing  tone  of 
defiance  and  challenge.  I  wish  I  were  in  better  health,  and 
I  wish  and  wish  and  wish  I  could  see  my  way  clear  to  saying 
something,  or  doing  something,  to  satisfy  my  own  conscience 
and  soothe  the  outraged  feelings  of  others.  Monstrous  enor- 
mities have  undoubtedly  been  committed.  In  Kansas  is  real- 
ized the  *  abomination  of  desolation  standing  where  it  ought 
not.'  Pierce  ought  to  have  sent  Scott  there  a  month  ago, 
to  enforce  peace  at  all  hazards,  —  though  his  presence  and 
prestige  would  have  averted  all  hazards  without  a  blow.  It 
is  a  perfect  farce  that  there  should  be  a  President  at  one  end 
of  Pennsylvania  Avenue  and  a  Congress  at  the  other,  and 
nothing  done  to  prevent  such  an  outrage  as  the  destruction 
of  Lawrence.  But,  bad  as  the  beginning  has  been,  I  fear 
worse  remains  behind.  How  is  civil  war  to  be  finally  extin- 
guished and  any  hope  of  free  soil  to  be  secured  ?  This  is  a 
question  for  deeper  wisdom  than  any  which  Emigrant  Aid 
Societies,  just  and  justifiable  though  they  may  be,  have  ever 
yet  brought  to  it.  Massachusetts  men  have  either  done  too 
much  or  too  little.  I  am  not  sure  their  efforts  have  as  yet 
accomplished  anything  of  substantial  good.  A  quieter  action 
would  have  answered  a  better  purpose,  but  Quietus  is  not  the 


184  A   MEMOIR   OF 

patron  saint  of  these  times,  notwithstanding  his  bones  have 
been  brought  over  and  enshrined  on  our  soil.  As  to  the  at- 
tack on  Sumner,  I  cannot  exaggerate  my  sense  of  its  atrocity. 
If  I  were  in  the  House  I  should  vote  to  expel  his  assailant 
forthwith,  and  censure  his  two  comrades.  But  I  am  amazed 
that  any  moderate  men  should  allow  themselves  to  be  drawn 
into  a  position  which  might  seem  to  approve  Sumner's  speech. 
A  more  offensive,  irritating,  and  unparliamentary  philippic 
was  never  uttered  in  any  legislative  body  ;  and  it  will  be  an 
evil  day  for  the  country  if  we  shall  so  far  yield  to  the  im- 
pulses of  a  generous  and  honorable  sympathy  with  the  injured 
author  as  to  hold  up  such  a  style  of  personal  assault  as  a 
model  for  the  imitation  of  our  ingenuous  youth.  It  is  only 
less  bad  than  the  physical  violence  which  it  provoked.^  Anti- 
slavery  agitation  has  introduced  a  strain  of  vituperation  and 
defamation  into  our  discussions  which  is  perfectly  unendur- 
able. Nor  is  it  fair  to  charge  the  whole  South  with  complicity 
in  this  outrage  because  a  few  newspapers  and  a  few  hot-heads 
have  applauded  it.  The  best  Southern  papers  condemn  it, 
and  even  Botts  has  come  out  nobly  for  expulsion.  There  are 
as  many  Christian  gentlemen  at  the  South  as  at  the  North,  if 
we  will  only  give  them  a  fair  chance  to  say  what  they  think. 
I  do  not  agree,  either,  that  an  attempt,  however  outrageous, 
to  avenge  what  were  considered  by  infuriated  Hotspurs  as 
insulting  personalities,  comes  up  to  the  full  measure  of  the 
true  idea  of  a  sectional  attack  on  freedom  of  speech. 

[June  11.]  The  simultaneousness  of  the  suggestion  in  my 
letter  to  Dr.  Howe,  and  Crittenden's  motion  in  the  Senate, 
may  furnish  matter  for  the  quid  nuncs.^  The  truth  is,  I  wrote 
confidentially  to  Crittenden,  urging  him  to  do  something,  and 
suggested  this  very  thing.  Under  the  circumstances,  I  am 
glad  the  printing  of  my  letter  was  delayed,  as  I  much  prefer 

1  Mr.  Seward  told  Mr.  Winthrop  (in  Vienna,  in  1859)  that  he  had 
vainly  entreated  Mr.  Sumner  to  soften  certain  passages,  which  the  latter 
had  read  to  him  in  advance. 

2  The  plan  for  sending  General  Scott  to  Kansas  with  full  powers. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  185 

Crittenden's  movement  should  take  all  the  credit,  and  have 
priority  in  the  Southern  estimation.  It  will  thus  stand  a 
better  chance  of  being  regarded  with  favor.  If  any  good 
comes  of  it  (and  I  see  that  Seward  has  indorsed  it)  I  shall  be 
sufficiently  rewarded  by  the  result.  Further  explanations 
when  we  meet. 

[July  6.]  Our  excellent  friend,  Ephraim  Peabody,  who,  I 
fear,  is  not  long  for  this  world,  met  at  St.  Augustine  an 
officer  who  had  been  much  employed  in  Kansas  until  a  very 
recent  period,  and  who  had  enjoyed  many  personal  opportu- 
nities of  knowing  what  was  going  on  there.  From  him 
Peabody  formed  a  by  no  means  favorable  impression  of  Reeder 
and  Robinson,  which  confirmed  what  I  heard  not  long  before 
from  others.  Peabody  does  not  hesitate  to  pronounce  the 
Republican  movement  to  be,  in  his  judgment,  an  organization 
of  Disunion.  This  is  farther  than  I  am  prepared  to  go  my- 
self, but  I  fully  agreed  with  him  when  he  spoke  of  Theodore 
Parker  and  Wendell  Phillips  and  Charles  Sumner  and  the 
rest  as  having  gradually  educated  our  people  to  relish  nothing 
but  the  'eloquence  of  abuse.'  As  to  the  Whig  Caucus,  1 
went  there  for  five  minutes  on  my  way  to  the  Agricultural 
Trustees'  dinner  at  C.  G.  Loring's  in  Beverly.  My  main  ob- 
ject in  going  was  to  put  a  stop  to  a  foolish  story  that  I  had 
come  out  for  Buchanan.  I  declared  myself  uncommitted  to 
any  candidate,  and  disposed  to  pursue  a  policy  of  observation 
and  expectation.  Last  week  I  sent  a  letter  to  Rives,  in  reply 
to  one  he  had  addressed  to  me  in  the  '  National  Intelligencer,' 
in  which  I  sufficiently  indicated  my  non-concurrence  with 
some  of  his  constitutional  views.^  Fillmore's  speech  at  Albany 
was  not  entirely  to  my  taste.  He  had  better  have  left  some 
things  unsaid,  though  his  general  view  of  the  danger  of  an 

1  William  Cabell  Rives,  long  Senator  from  Virginia,  twice  minister 
to  France,  and  author  of  the  Life  of  Madison,  was  a  statesman  whom  Mr. 
Winthrop  held  in  the  highest  esteem  and  with  whom  he  occasionally 
corresponded  upon  public  affairs.  This  particular  letter  to  him  will  be 
found  in  the  appendix  to  the  second  volume  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  works. 


186  A  MEMOIR  OF 

essentially  sectional  administration  is  a  strong  and  startling 
one.  Burlingame,  however,  seems  to  have  denounced  as 
traitors  in  advance  all  who  hold  back  from  the  great  Northern 
Raid.  His  reception  seems  to  have  almost  equalled  Webster's 
five  years  ago.  It  looks  as  if  Brooks's  bludgeon  had  given  a 
sort  of  coujj  de  grace  to  the  Whig  party.  Judge  Arthur  P. 
Butler  has  sent  me  a  dozen  copies  of  his  speech,  and  I  will 
send  you  one.  Audi  alteram  partem  is  a  safe  rule,  and  though 
this  speech  does  not  change  one's  views  of  his  nephew's  con- 
duct, it  will  give  you  a  juster  and  more  favorable  impression 
of  the  uncle.  A  gentleman  from  Louisiana,  who  brought  me 
a  note  the  other  day,  told  me  that  he  had  not  met  a  single 
person  at  the  South,  in  his  own  rank  of  life,  who  approved 
the  assault  on  Sumner.  Did  I  tell  you  that  both  Choate  and 
Levi  Lincoln,  who  do  not  always  agree,  cordially  approved 
my  letter  to  S.  G.  Howe? 

[July  11.]  I  cannot  go  Buchanan  and  his  platform.  Per- 
sonally, I  could  look  with  complacency  upon  the  election  of 
Fremont  and  Dayton,  —  the  latter,  you  may  remember,  is  one 
of  my  best  friends,  —  but  whether  I  can  see  my  way  clear  to 
giving  aid  and  comfort  to  the  Republican  party  and  taking 
my  share  of  the  responsibility  of  the  results,  is  another  matter. 
The  resolutions  of  the  Whigs  of  Maryland  come  nearer  my 
way  of  thinking  than  anything  I  have  met  with  lately, — 
bating,  of  course,  some  phrases. 

[Aug.  17.]  To-morrow's  '  Courier '  will  contain  a  brief 
note  of  mine  which  pretty  much  settles  my  political  position. 
With  no  candidate  of  our  own,  Whigs  are  compelled  to  choose 
between  the  three  in  the  field.  Choate  has  swallowed  Bu- 
chanan, but  I  could  not  do  it ;  while  all  my  convictions  are 
opposed  to  a  sectional  party  under  Fremont.  Nothing  re- 
mained but  to  support  Fillmore,  which,  in  my  judgment, 
comes  nearest  to  maintaining  my  old  position,  however  little 
I  may  fancy  the  '  American '  party  so-called.  It  is  a  relief  to 
me  to  have  declared  my  preference,  as  every  day  was  bringing 
me  letters  from  North,  South,  East,  or  West,  asking  me  to 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  187 

declare  for  Fremont,  to  speak  for  Fillmore,  or  to  join  the 
Democracy.  Choate's  course  threw  suspicion  on  all  Conser- 
vative men  who  were  silent.  Everett,  Nathan  and  William 
Apple  ton,  Hillard,  and  many  others  think  as  I  do.  I  had  a 
great  treat  here  at  Nahant  last  Sunday,  in  two  sermons  from 
Professor  Park.  He  has  no  superior,  and  few  equals,  in  the 
pulpit  of  any  denomination. 

[Aug.  30.]  I  hate  to  be  pressed  into  political  service  just 
as  I  am  giving  the  last  touches  to  my  Franklin  Statue  Ora- 
tion. Certain  gentlemen,  however,  insist  upon  mj^  presiding 
at  the  Whig  Convention,  and  I  have  not  been  able  to  get  off. 
I  shall  try  to  be  conciliatory  and  save  pieces  enough  for  a  re- 
composition  hereafter,  but  there  is  nothing  harder  than  such 
an  effort  at  such  a  moment.  It  is  easy  to  speak  on  either  ex- 
treme. Moderation  is  always  dull.  There  is  nothing  impul- 
sive or  emotional  about  it.  There  was  a  moment  in  the 
early  part  of  this  hurly-burly  when  it  would  not  have  been 
difficult  for  me  to  go  for  Fremont.  There  was  another  mo- 
ment when  I  even  contemplated  Buchanan.  The  pendulum 
oscillated  two  or  three  times  and  then  settled  down  in  the  old 
perpendicular.  I  don't  think  it  will  swing  again.  But  I  am 
ready  to  make  allowance  for  the  vibrations  and  oscillations  of 
other  people  while  I  am  so  conscious  of  my  own.  Nor  am  I 
insensible  to  the  suggestion  that  what  seems  perpendicular  to 
my  own  eye  may  after  all  strike  others  as  very  oblique.  Tell 
Grinnell  I  duly  received  his  Fremont  song,  and  am  sorry  it 
does  not  suit  my  voice.  If  he  will  come  and  sing  it  to  me,  I 
might  be  converted  at  the  eleventh  hour.  Meantime  I  think 
of  sending  him  a  '  Star-spangled  Banner '  just  published  by 
the  '  Nationals.' 

Mr.  Winthrop's  speech  on  taking  the  chair  of  the 
Whig  State  Convention  (Sept.  3,  1856)  is  to  be  found 
in  his  second  volume.  As  prefigured  in  the  foregoing 
letter,  it  was  moderate  and  conciliatory,  —  so  much  so 
that  it  was  criticised  in  some  quarters  as  lacking  his 


188  A  MEMOIR  OF 

accustomed  fire  and  partaking  of  the  nature  of  an 
anodyne,  —  a  description  certainly  not  applicable  to  a 
campaign  speech  of  his  at  Faneuil  Hall  on  the  24th 
of  October,  when  the  fray  had  thickened.  From  this 
latter  I  quote  a  passage  or  two :  — 

I  cannot  help  sometimes  envying  the  orators  of  the  Free- 
Soil  party  the  facility  and  obviousness  of  their  appeals,  and 
coveting  the  fertility  and  availableness  of  their  topics.  I 
have  even  been  tempted  to  flatter  myself  that  I  could  be  an 
orator,  also,  if  I  could  find  in  my  conscientious  convictions  of 
propriety  or  patriotism  to  employ  the  materials  which  they 
employ  in  the  way  in  which  they  employ  them,  —  to  serve  up 
the  same  sort  of  dishes  with  the  same  amount  of  sauce.  We 
all  know  by  heart  the  recipe  for  a  regular  Free-Soil  speech  in 
these  days.  One  third  part  Missouri  Compromise  Repeal, 
without  one  grain  of  allowance  for  the  indisputable  fact  that 
it  was  proposed  and  supported  by  Northern  men,  and  could 
not  have  been  carried  without  their  aid ;  one  third  Kansas  Out- 
rages by  Border  Ruffians,  without  one  scruple  of  doubt  as  to 
the  wisdom  of  the  Northern  measures  which,  reasonably  or 
unreasonably,  have  furnished  so  much  of  their  pretext  and 
provocation ;  and  one  third  disjointed  facts,  and  misapplied 
figures,  and  great  swelling  words  of  vanity,  to  prove  that  the 
South  is,  upon  the  whole,  the  very  poorest,  meanest,  least  pro- 
ductive, and  most  miserable  part  of  creation,  and  therefore 
ought  to  be  continually  teased  and  taunted  and  reproached 
and  reviled  by  everybody  who  feels  himself  to  be  better  off. 
This,  Mr.  Chairman,  is  the  brief  prescription  for  a  mixture, 
which,  seasoned  to  the  taste  and  administered  foaming,  is  as 
certain  to  di'aw,  and  as  sure  to  produce  the  desired  inflamma- 
tion, as  a  plaster  of  Burgundy  pitch  or  Spanish  flies  is  to  raise 
a  blister.  The  truth  is,  and  it  is  a  sad  truth,  that  we  are  all 
becoming  gradually  educated  to  the  language  of  abuse,  — 
educated  to  listen  to  it,  to  relish  it,  and  to  employ  it.  The 
old  phrases  of  soberness  and  truth,  the  old  forms  of  argument 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  189 

and  appeal,  have  lost  their  power  to  attract  or  interest  us. 
We  must  have  racy  and  rancorous  personalities,  inflated  repre- 
sentations and  turgid  exaggerations  of  individual  or  sectional 
wrongs,  stinging  and  venomous  invectives  upon  some  person, 
or  some  measure,  or  some  institution,  —  in  order  to  gratify 
our  perverted  tastes  and  prurient  appetites.  These  are  the 
deplorable  results  of  a  style  of  address  which,  commencing 
not  a  great  while  ago,  on  a  few  anniversary  platforms  and  in 
a  few  ([uasi  pulpits,  has  gradually  found  its  way  into  almost 
every  public  assembly,  and  has  infected  and  poisoned  the 
whole  atmosphere  of  political  discussion.  I  am  glad  that,  on 
this  point  at  least,  I  have  not  been  wholly  misrepresented  of 
late,  even  by  those  from  whom  I  most  widely  differ.  Some 
of  you  may  have  seen  a  newspaper  commentary  on  some  re- 
cent remarks  of  mine,  in  which,  after  other  and  more  caustic 
criticisms,  my  speech  was  pronounced  to  be  about  as  good  as 
a  dose  of  chloroform.  I  thank  the  writer  of  that  article, 
whoever  he  was.  Chloroform,  sir !  Why,  it  is  the  very  thing 
of  all  others  which  is  most  needed  at  this  moment  for  the 
political  peace  and  safety  of  our  country.  If  a  little  of  it 
could  only  have  been  administered  before  certain  blows  were 
struck,  which  we  all  deplore  and  condemn ;  if  a  little  of  it 
could  have  been  administered  before  certain  words  were 
spoken,  which  some  of  us  cannot  applaud  or  approve  ;  if  a 
little  of  it  could  have  been  administered  when  rash  and  reck- 
less men  were  first  precipitating  us  into  these  perilous  con- 
troversies by  the  breaking  up  of  old  compacts  and  by  the 
earlier  resistance  to  more  recent  laws ;  if  a  great  deal  of  it 
could  have  been  scattered  broadcast  over  that  unfortunate 
Territory  of  Kansas,  before  a  blow  had  been  struck  or  a  rifle 
loaded  on  either  side,  —  if  chloroform  could  have  been  season- 
ably and  successfully  applied  to  such  purposes  as  these,  that 
mysterious  anaesthetic  agent  would  have  established  its  char- 
acter politically,  as  it  has  done  already  personally,  as  the  most 
blessed  anodyne  which  the  pharmacy  of  the  world  has  ever 
furnished.     The  preservation  of  the  Union  might  thus  have 


190  A  MEMOIR  OF 

been  associated  with  another  Jackson  besides  him  of  Tennes- 
see, and  the  peace  and  honor  of  our  own  Commonwealth  with 
another  Morton  besides  him  of  Taunton.^  It  is  now,  indeed, 
too  late  for  all  this,  and  I  fear  we  must  say  to  Kansas  at  least, 
in  the  language,  though  by  no  means  in  the  spirit,  of  lago  to 
the  Moor  of  Venice,  — 

*  Not  poppy,  nor  mandragora, 
Not  all  the  drowsy  syrups  of  the  world, 
Shall  ever  med'cine  thee  to  that  sweet  sleep 
Which  thou  owedst  yesterday.' 

Yet  even  now,  whatever  is  to  be  done  for  Kansas  is,  in 
my  judgment,  to  be  sooner  done  and  better  done  by  appeals 
to  reason  than  by  resort  to  rifles,  —  by  the  restoration  of  har- 
mony and  concord  throughout  the  country  than  by  any  con- 
tinuance of  angry  agitation  or  any  political  triumph  whatever. 
At  any  rate,  it  cannot  be  denied  that  there  is  still  room  for 
the  application  of  chloroform  elsewhere.  If  a  little  of  it  could 
even  now  be  inhaled  in  Carolina  and  in  Massachusetts,  —  if 
a  few  drops  could  be  sprinkled  over  a  certain  Southern  town- 
ship, called  '  96,'  I  think,  or  even  over  a  few  pulpits  and  pro- 
fessional chairs  nearer  home,  —  I  am  sure  that  the  condition  of 
the  whole  country  would  be  all  the  better  for  it ;  and  for  the 
latter  part  of  the  process,  I  know  of  nobody  who  would  hold 
the  sponge  more  hopefully  than  our  worthy  friend,  Dr.  Luther 
V.  Bell.2  We  have,  indeed,  fallen  upon  strange  times.  We 
hear  one  great  political  party  indulging  in  frantic  shouts  that 
the  institutions  of  the  North  —  our  free  labor,  our  free  speech, 
our  free  territory  —  are  all  in  imminent  danger  of  being  over- 
thrown or  overrun ;  and  we  see  masses  of  men  among  us 
rushing  along  in  a  wild,  unreasoning  frenzy  to  their  rescue. 
We  hear  another  great  party  vociferating  with  an  even  noisier 
clamor  in  other  quarters  that  the  institutions  of  the  South 
are  in  immediate  jeopardy,  —  their  property,  their  slave  labor, 

^  A  controversy  was  then  raging  as  to  the  relative  share  of  Doctors 
Jackson  and  Morton  in  the  introduction  of  anaesthetics, 
2  Dr.  Bell  was  then  the  Whig  candidate  for  Governor. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  191 

their  equal  rights  to  the  enjoyment  of  common  privileges 
and  possessions,  —  and  we  see  them  banding  themselves  to- 
gether to  meet  the  assault  with  whatever  of  desperate  energy 
a  sense  of  impending  wrong  can  stimulate.  Take  up  a  South- 
ern paper,  or  listen  to  a  Southern  speech,  and  you  would 
suppose  that  the  whole  history  of  this  government,  from  its 
earliest  organization,  and  a  little  before,  had  been  one  un- 
broken succession  of  injuries  and  oppressions  committed  by 
the  North  upon  the  South.  Take  up  a  Northern  paper,  or 
listen  to  a  Northern  speech,  and  you  would  imagine  that 
there  had  been  no  glorious  liberty  enjoyed,  no  unrivalled 
prosperity  experienced,  no  unexampled  progress  witnessed 
among  us,  but  that  year  after  year  all  the  hopes  and  expec- 
tations and  promises  of  our  free  institutions  had  been  blasted 
and  overwhelmed  by  the  aggressions  of  a  domineering  and 
detestable  Southern  oligarchy.  Exaggerated  and  ridiculously 
intensified,  as  I  hold  all  such  representations  on  both  sides  to 
be,  I  believe  there  is  as  much  sincerity  in  the  authors  of  them 
at  one  end  of  the  Union  as  at  the  other;  and  I  am  not  of 
that  class,  if  any  such  there  be,  who  hold  them  to  be  abso- 
lutely unfounded  at  either  end.  Without  going  into  the 
details  of  the  case,  at  present,  on  either  side,  I  do  not  hesi- 
tate to  express  my  belief  that  the  success  of  the  Democracy 
on  the  principles  of  the  Cincinnati  platform  and  the  Ostend 
Circular  would  be  dangerous  to  the  rightful  interests  and 
claims  of  the  free  States ;  and  that,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
success  of  the  Republican  party  —  it  might  better  be  called 
the  semi-Bepiiblican  party,  for  its  organization  embraces  only 
about  half  the  Republic  —  would  be  dangerous  to  the  legiti- 
mate power  and  rights  of  the  Southern  States.  I  rejoice, 
therefore,  that  there  is  a  third  party,  which  sees  that  out  of 
these  local  and  sectional  dangers  is  made  up  one  great 
national  danger,  —  that  the  whole  country  is  in  danger  from 
the  success  of  either  of  them,  and  that  the  best  safety  of  the 
Union  is  to  be  found  in  the  defeat  of  them  both.  And  most 
heartily  do  I  wish  that  this  third  party  could  be  seen  rising 


192  A   MEMOIR   OF 

up,  like  an  army  with  banners,  in  sufficient  strength  to  come 
effectually  between  the  two  angry  combatants,  who  are  sacri- 
ficing the  concord  and  unity  of  the  nation  to  their  intemper- 
ate violence,  —  just  as  some  stout  policeman,  or  some  brave 
and  philanthropic  bystander,  would  thrust  himself  between 
two  quarrelsome  customers  in  the  streets,  interposing  his  stal- 
wart form  and  brawny  arm  as  a  barrier  to  all  further  blows, 
and  crying,  iVo,  you  donH^  to  them  both.  Yes,  that 's  the 
word, — no,  you  don't,  —  to  both  of  them.  'No,  you  don't 
disturb  our  domestic  peace.  No,  you  don't  blot  out  the 
memory  of  common  dangers  and  common  glories  which  has 
so  long  bound  us  together  as  brethren.  No,  you  don't 
break  up  that  noble  fabric  of  constitutional  law  and  liberty, 
which  is  the  best  protection  of  all  who  enjoy  it,  and  the  best 
hope  of  all  who,  at  home  or  abroad,  are  struggling  in  bond- 
age. No,  you  don't  dissolve  the  Union.  Back,  both  of  you, 
and  get  cool.  No  more  broken  compacts,  no  more  personal 
assaults,  no  more  challenges  and  duels,  no  more  sectional 
strife.  Hands  off  each  other's  throats.  Back,  both  of  you, 
and  learn  to  govern  yourselves  before  you  presume  to  govern 
the  country ! '  That  is  the  spirit  in  which  we  are  assembled 
here  this  evening.  That  is  the  spirit  in  which  you  and  I  and 
all  of  us,  who  still  cling  to  the  old  Whig  standard,  have  come 
here  to  ratify  the  nomination  of  Millard  Fillmore.  And  that 
is  the  spirit  in  which  we  believe  that  he  would  enter  upon 
his  administration,  and  conduct  it  safely  and  prosperously  to 
its  close.  We  seek  not  to  commit  the  reins  of  our  Chariot  of 
the  Sun  to  any  veteran  Jehu  whose  vision  may  have  grown 
oblique  by  gazing  too  intently  on  the  Southern  Cross ;  nor 
are  we  quite  ready  to  intrust  them  to  any  youthful  Phaeton 
who  would  incline  too  closely  to  the  Northern  Bear ;  but  we 
would  deliver  them  once  more  to  that  experienced  and  even- 
handed  patriot,  who  has  once  guided  the  fiery  coursers  safely 
along  the  Ecliptic,  holding  them  as  steadily  upon  the  track 
through  the  perilous  passes  of  the  Lion  and  the  Scorpion  as 
over  the  gentler  elevations  or  declivities  of  the  Virgin  and 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  193 

the  Scales,  and  keeping  successively  in  sight,  and  always  and 
equally  in  mind,  the  whole  one  and  thirty  stars  of  our  great 
American  constellation ! 

...  If  yonder  votive  canvas  could  speak,  if  the  lips  of  the 
Father  of  his  Country  could  at  this  moment  be  unsealed,  what 
other  meaning  could  he  give  to  his  own  memorable  words  of 
warning  ?  Not  a  geographical  party  !  Why,  how  long  is  it 
since  it  was  distinctly  declared  by  some  of  the  present  leaders 
of  the  Republican  party  that  the  great  remedy  for  existing 
evils  was  the  formation  of  a  party  which  should  have  no 
Southern  wing,  —  that  was  the  phrase,  no  Southern  iving^  — 
for  it  was  added  that  as  long  as  there  was  a  Southern  wing, 
there  must  be  compliances  and  concessions  to  the  South,  and 
compromises  would  be  the  order  of  the  day.  Away  back  in 
1847,  that  was  the  object  of  a  resolution  in  a  Whig  conven- 
tion, which  I  had  the  honor  to  oppose,  and  which,  I  rejoice  to 
say,  was  defeated.  But  the  defeat,  it  seems,  was  not  final, 
and  the  object  has  at  length  been  accomplished.  We  have 
now  a  party  without  any  Southern  wing,  and  it  is  looked  upon 
in  some  quarters  as  the  opening  of  the  first  parallel  of  the 
great  antislavery  siege  which  has  so  long  been  projected.  The 
result  of  such  an  organization  remains  still  to  be  developed. 
But  I  am  now  where  I  always  have  been.  I  am  against  all 
such  organizations.  I  have  no  faith  in  any  party  which  tries 
to  fly  up  into  the  high  places  of  this  great  republic  on  one 
wing.  As  soon  should  I  look  to  see  the  imperial  bird  which 
is  the  chosen  emblem  of  our  country's  glory,  cleaving  the 
clouds  and  pursuing  his  fearless  and  upward  path  through 
the  skies,  if  one  of  his  wings  had  been  ruthlessly  lopped  off. 
I  want  no  maimed  or  mutilated  emblem  of  my  country's  pro- 
gress. I  would  not  pluck  a  single  plume  from  his  pinions 
even  to  feather  my  own  New  England  nest.  And  still  less 
do  I  want  any  maimed  or  mutilated  country.  Nothing  less 
than  the  whole,  however  bounded,  —  or,  certainly,  however  it 
is  now  rightfully  bounded,  —  will  content  me.  And  I  desire 
to  see  no  party  organizations  from  which  any  portion  of  that 

13 


194  A  MEMOIR  OF 

country  is  intentionally  or  necessarily  excluded.  When  a 
party  composed  of  only  half  the  States  in  the  Union  shall 
assert  its  title  to  the  name  of  a  national  party,  and  shall  be 
claimed  and  recognized  as  such,  it  will  not  be  long,  I  fear,  — 
it  will  not  be  long,  —  before  half  the  States  will  claim  to  be 
recognized  as  a  nation  by  themselves.  A  semi-republican 
party  is  only  the  first  step  to  a  semi-republic,  and  we  all  know 
it  is  the  first  step  that  costs.  ...  I  am  no  panic-maker,  nor 
have  I  ever  set  myself  up  to  be  much  of  a  '  union-saver.' 
But  this  I  do  say,  that  this  continued  scuffling  and  wrangling 
between  sections,  these  perpetual  contentions  and  conflicts 
between  the  North  and  the  South,  are  so  shaking  the  founda- 
tions and  jarring  the  superstructure  and  loosening  the  cement 
of  our  great  republican  fabric,  that  even  if  nobody  should 
ever  care  to  assail  it  directly,  it  may  one  day  or  other  become 
absolutely  untenantable,  and  be  found  falling  to  pieces  by 
itself,  by  its  own  weakness  and  its  own  weight.  And  I  do 
say,  also,  that  every  man  who  loves  that  Union  —  as  others 
do,  I  doubt  not,  quite  as  sincerely  and  perhaps  more  wisely 
than  myself  —  should  look  to  it  seasonably  that  by  no  word, 
act,  or  vote  of  his,  which  is  not  absolutely  essential  to  the 
vindication  of  rights  and  privileges  which  are  never  to  be 
abandoned,  he  hastens  and  precipitates  a  catastrophe  which 
it  may  be  too  late  to  repent,  and  which  no  time  or  wisdom 
may  be  able  to  repair,  and  when  a  voice  may  be  heard  over 
our  land,  like  that  which  once  sounded  over  Jerusalem  of 
old :  '  If  thou  hadst  known,  even  in  this  thy  day,  the  things 
which  belong  to  thy  peace,  —  but  now  they  are  hid  from  thine 
eyes ! ' 

IX. 

[Oct.  2,  1856.]  We  got  back  from  Berkshire  in  season  to 
dine  with  John  E.  Thayer  at  Brookline,  to  meet  the  Mere- 
diths of  Baltimore.  We  overtook  the  Presidential  train  at 
Springfield,  and  on  my  going  to  pay  my  respects,  Pierce  in- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  195 

sisted  upon  coming  into  our  car  to  shake  hands  with  Mrs 
Winthrop,  and  told  me  that  if  the  Senate  Bill  had  passed  he 
had  intended  to  name  me  one  of  the  Commissioners  to  Kansas. 
It  would  have  been  a  thankless  task,  but  one  difficult  to  re- 
fuse. I  had  a  long  talk  with  Hamilton  Fish  in  New  York, 
and  met  there,  among  others,  an  old  school-mate  of  mine, 
George  Goldthwaite,  whom  I  had  not  seen  since  he  left  the 
Boston  Latin  School.  He  has  been  Chief  Justice  of  Alabama, 
is  a  large  slave-owner  and  a  warm  advocate  of  the  peculiar 
institution.  Frank  Gray  is,  I  fear,  slowly  nearing  his  end. 
If  he  could  bequeath  all  his  information  to  some  one  of  equal 
capacity  to  digest,  remember,  and  recall  it  at  will,  it  would  be 
a  richer  legacy  than  even  his  ample  fortune.  I  have  found 
his  conversation  more  instructive  than  that  of  any  man  of  my 
time.^ 

[Jan.  19,  1857.]  We  are  said  to  have  four  feet  of  snow  in 
our  streets,  and  it  is  still  snowing.  Benton  has  been  here,  full 
of  the  necessity  of  preparing  for  the  next  General  Election. 
What  pluck  the  old  fellow  has  at  seventy-five !  He  and 
Granger  dined  with  me,  and  some  one  mentioned  that,  since 
his  re-election,  Sumner  had  avowed  a  purpose  to  make  a 
speech  in  the  Senate,  in  comparison  with  which  the  one  that 
cost  him  a  beating  will  be  as  molasses  and  water  to  first-proof 
brandy.  James  A.  Pearce  must  have  prefigured  this  when  he 
wrote  me  last  month  that,  although  he  had  five  years  left  of 
his  term,  he  doubted  whether  he  could  stand  the  Senate  much 
longer,  finding  '  no  adequate  compensation  in  the  bare  and 
fruitless  performance  of  duty.'  He  speaks  of  having  been 
with  the  Democrats,  rather  than  of  them,  in  the  late  campaign, 
and  this  is  undoubtedly  the  feeling  of  other  Southern  Whigs 
similarly  situated.  I  sent  you  my  talk  at  the  gathering  of 
Sons  of  Connecticut  —  no  great  things.  I  have  half  promised 
our  old  Handel  and  Haydn  Society  to  deliver  an  address  on 
Music  in  New  England  at  a  festival  they  are  arranging  for 

1  Hon.  Francis  C.  Gray,  for  some  account  of  whom  see  the  fifth  vol- 
ume of  the  second  series  of  this  Society's  Proceedings. 


196  A  MEMOIR   OF 

the  early  spring.  I  should  rather  like  to  do  this,  as  really 
good  music  has  been  and  is  the  greatest  pleasure  of  my 
life. 

On  the  17th  of  June,  1857,  a  celebration  took  place 
on  Bunker  Hill,  under  the  auspices  of  the  Bunker  Hill 
Monument  Association,  when  Edward  Everett  deliv- 
ered an  address  at  the  unveiling  of  a  statue  of  Joseph 
Warren.  Besides  bidding  to  this  commemoration  dis- 
tinguished persons  from  all  parts  of  the  country,  the 
Committee  of  Arrangements  saw  fit  to  extend  a  whole- 
sale invitation  to  the  entire  Senate  of  the  United  States, 
and  they  were  made  not  a  little  uncomfortable  by  find- 
ing that,  among  the  very  few  acceptances,  was  one  from 
James  M.  Mason  of  Virginia,  who,  as  the  author  of 
the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  was  more  unpopular  in  New 
England  than  any  other  Southern  statesman.  Having 
unexpectedly  caught  this  Tartar,  the  committee  pro- 
ceeded to  request  Mr.  Winthrop,  as  a  vice-president  of 
the  Association,  and  an  old  acquaintance  of  Mr.  Mason, 
to  show  him  some  little  attention,  and  formally  intro- 
duce him  to  the  guests  at  the  banquet  which  followed 
the  literary  exercises ;  in  doing  which,  after  paying  a 
brief  compliment  to  Virginia,  Mr.  ^Yinthrop  used  the 
following  language :  — 

The  State  to  which  I  refer,  and  which  was  once  entitled  by 
the  people  of  Boston  assembled  in  Faneuil  Hall  '  our  noble, 
patriotic  sister-colony,  Virginia,'  is  represented  here  to-day  by 
one  of  her  distinguished  Senators  in  Congress,  —  a  gentleman 
whom  I  have  known  personally  in  a  sphere  of  common  duty, 
—  whose  name  is  associated,  in  more  than  one  generation, 
with  eminent  service  in  his  native  State  and  in  the  national 
councils,  and  whom  I  take  pleasure  in  welcoming  here,  in 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  197 

your  behalf,  on  this,  his  first  visit  to  New  England.  I  present 
to  you,  fellow-citizens,  the  Honorable  James  Murray  Llason, 
a  Senator  of  the  United  States  from  the  Old  Dominion. 

Less  than  three  weeks  afterward  occurred  the  annual 
celebration  of  the  Fourth  of  July  by  the  Municipality 
of  Boston,  when  the  appointed  orator  of  the  day  took 
occasion  to  stigmatize  Mr.  Winthrop's  course  in  the 
above  matter  as  an  exhibition  of  "complimentary 
flunkyism."  Thereupon  ensued  one  of  those  acrimo- 
nious controversies  as  indigenous  to  this  neighborhood 
as  its  east  wind,  —  the  City  government  declining  to 
print  the  oration,  and  the  friends  of  its  author  writing 
excited  letters  to  the  newspapers/  claiming  that  he  had 
only  administered  "another  deserved  rebuke"  to  Mr. 
Winthrop,  who  preferred  to  take  no  public  notice  of 
what  had  occurred,  but  who  incidentally  alluded  to  it 
in  the  following  private  letter:  — 

[July  21.]  We  had  a  good  time  at  the  Alumni  Festival, 
but  as  presiding  officer  I  had  to  propose  so  many  toasts  and 
make  so  many  speeches  that  I  was  quite  exhausted.  Napier  ^ 
was  charming,  and  I  took  him  down  to  dine  with  Prescott. 
As  to  the  Mason  matter,  I  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  invita- 
tions, and  did  not  know  he  was  coming  until  two  days  before 
the  celebration.  He  is  no  favorite  of  mine,  and  I  once  had  a 
brush  with  him  in  the  Senate ;  but  he  was  here  as  our  invited 
guest,  and  it  seemed  only  reasonable  to  forget  political  differ- 
ences and  treat  him  as  the  representative  of  Virginia,  as  one 
who  had  been  acting  Vice-President  of  the  United  States  and 

1  The  "Antislavery  Standard,"  among  others,  had  a  letter  from 
William  Jay,  proclaiming  that,  while  "  Boston  has  no  monopoly  of 
flunkyism,  she  has  contrived  to  give  it  a  depth  and  an  intensity  rarely 
surpassed  by  the  most  ingenious  servility." 

2  The  tenth  Lord  Napier  of  Merchistoun,  then  British  Minister  to  the 
United  States,  who  made  an  effective  speech  at  the  Alumni  dinner. 


198  A   MEMOIR   OF 

is  still  Chairman  of  the  Senate  Committee  on  Foreign  Rela- 
tions. Wilson  and  Burlingame  both  told  me,  on  the  spot, 
that  they  were  glad  he  was  there,  and  as  they  both  compli- 
mented me  on  the  way  in  which  I  introduced  him,  they  could 
have  had  nothing  to  do  with  this  attack.  I  have  never,  to  my 
knowledge,  seen  my  assailant,  who,  I  am  told,  is  not  only  a 
minister  of  the  Gospel,  but  a  man  of  cultivation.  I  have 
prompted  no  action  with  regard  to  him,  but  I  cannot  consider 
his  course  calculated  to  give  a  favorable  impression  of  New 
England  hospitality.  During  my  public  life  I  have  certainly 
experienced  a  variety  of  epithets.  '  Doughface  '  and  '  trimmer ' 
were  long  ago  familiar.  '  Codfish  aristocrat '  is  what  Andrew 
Johnson  amused  himself  by  calling  me  on  the  floor  of  the 
House.  Irate  Webster  men,  I  believe,  were  known  to  whisper 
'  Judas,'  and  Sumner,  as  you  may  remember,  once  intimated 
that  I  was  little  better  than  an  assassin!  But  'flunky'  is 
new,  and  it  has  an  ignoble  sound ;  but  I  do  not  mind  it  so 
much  as  the  mean  charge,  now  just  made,  that  I  modified  my 
language  about  ^lason  when  I  gave  it  to  the  printer.  You 
know  how  careful  I  am  about  my  ipsissima  verba. 

[Sept.  21.]  How  could  so  wise  a  man  as  our  friend  B.  R. 
Curtis  do  so  deplorable  a  thing  as  to  resign  from  the  U.  S. 
Supreme  Court  at  this  untimely  moment?  I  may  overesti- 
mate the  importance  of  his  course,  and  I  certainly  esteem  and 
respect  him,  but  I  have  never  known  a  resignation  which  has 
so  much  the  air  of  desertion.  Buchanan  will  have  a  chance 
to  make  the  Court  still  less  acceptable  to  this  part  of  the 
country.  As  to  local  politics,  Banks  and  Gardner  are  beating 
the  air  per  alios  et  per  se,  trying  which  can  say  the  hardest 
things  of  each  other.  There  is  no  Whig  ticket,  and  I  can  at 
least  rejoice  at  being  under  no  obligation  to  attend  conventions 
or  mount  stumps.  I  think  Banks  will  be  chosen,  but  I  need 
hardly  say  I  do  not  intend  to  vote  for  him.  I  may  do  him  an 
injustice,  but  he  strikes  me  as  partaking  a  good  deal  of  the 
solemn,  pretentious  humbug.  They  call  him  the  '  little  iron 
man,'  but  I  should  say  there  was  much  lead  and  a  considerable 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  199 

alloy  of  brass  in  his  composition.^  You  may  remember  that  in 
my  remarks  at  the  Alumni  dinner,  I  warmly  advocated  the  erec- 
tion of  a  hall  for  anniversary  festivals  and  other  appropriate 
occasions,  with  some  such  inscription  as  '  The  Alumni  of 
Harvard  to  their  Alma  Mater.'  It  has  greatly  gratified  me  to 
receive  a  cordial  letter  from  Charles  Sanders,  offering  $5,000 
for  this  purpose,  and  I  have  some  reason  to  think  he  may 
give  more  hereafter.^ 

Having  been  strongly  urged  to  declare  himself  in  the 
State  canvass,  Mr.  Winthrop  v^rote  a  letter,  dated  Oct. 
16,  1857,  and  addressed  to  Col.  J.  W.  Sever,  in  which 
he  recited  his  reasons  for  again  declining  to  vote  for 
the  candidate  of  a  sectional  party,  and  adding :  — 

I  am  disposed  to  vote  for  that  one  of  the  other  candidates 
who  stands  the  best  chance  of  defeating  the  Republican  ticket. 
The  friends  with  whom  I  have  heretofore  acted  seem  to  enter- 
tain the  fullest  confidence  that  Governor  Gardner  is  that 
man ;  and  unless  I  see  some  stronger  reason  for  distrusting 
their  judgment  than  I  do  now,  I  shall  give  him  a  vote  this 
year  for  the  first  time.  If  I  cannot  approve  every  act  of  his 
administration  thus  far,  I  think  it  is  at  least  safer  '  to  bear  the 
ills  we  have  than  fly  to  others  that  we  know  not  of.' 

1  find  in  his  scrap-book  a  leading  article  from  the 
"National  Intelligencer"  praising  his  course,  and  the 
following  extract  from  a  Boston  letter  in  the  New 
York  "Times":  — 

"  Mr.  Winthrop's  letter  to  the  Gardner  meeting  will  add  as 
little  to  the  Governor's  strength  as  to  the  writer's  reputation. 
It  is  plain  to  see  that  Mr.  Winthrop  hates  Governor  Gardner 

^  This  is  one  of  those  off-hand  characterizations  common  to  the 
familiar  letters  of  intimate  friends,  but  which  are  generally  to  be  taken 
cum  grano  salis.  Mr.  Winthrop  formed  a  more  complimentary  opinion 
of  General  Banks  when  he  knew  him  better. 

2  By  his  wiU,  Mr.  Sanders  left  $50,000  to  this  object. 


200  A   MEMOIR   OF 

only  one  degree  less  than  he  hates  Mr.  Banks,  and  that  per- 
sonal malignity  is  his  motive  of  action.  He  is  ready  to  do 
anything,  or  to  vote  for  any  person,  that  will  aid  him  most  to 
pay  an  ancient  grudge.  He  carries  into  the  political  arena 
the  same  intense  spitefulness  that  Shylock  took  into  court. 
Everybody  sees  this,  and  none  more  clearly  than  the  men 
whom  Mr.  Winthrop  thinks  he  is  aiding,  but  whom  in  reality 
he  injures.  It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  they  will  hold  them- 
selves under  any  very  special  obligations  to  him,  let  the 
election  go  as  it  may." 

On  the  8th  of  October,  1857,  Mr.  Winthrop  sub- 
mitted to  the  City  Council  a  memorial  prepared  by 
him  on  behalf  of  the  Boston  Provident  Association, 
in  which  he  earnestly  recommended  bringing  together 
under  a  common  roof  the  offices  of  the  principal  authori- 
ties and  associations  connected  with  the  charities  of 
Boston,  in  order  to  afford  not  merely  a  central  head- 
quarters for  investigation  and  relief,  but  a  temporary 
home  for  shelter,  and  to  facilitate  a  more  active  and 
systematic  division  of  duty  and  labor.  This  appeal, 
persistently  renewed  at  intervals  by  Mr.  Winthrop  and 
others,  ultimately  led  to  the  erection  of  the  well-known 
Charity  Bureau  in  Chardon  Street,  one  of  the  most  useful 
of  our  public  buildings ;  but  it  was  not  until  twelve  years 
later  that  he  had  the  gratification  of  making  an  opening 
address  within  its  walls.  Of  his  various  public  utter- 
ances during  the  year  1858,  the  most  important  w^as 
one  on  the  completion  and  dedication  of  the  Public 
Library,  of  which  more  than  two  years  before  he  had 
officiated  on  laying  the  corner-stone. 

[Feb.   8,  1858.]      Thanks   for  your   letter   from   Naples. 
The  climate  of  Italy  has  been  wafted  over  to  us  latterly,  and 


EGBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  201 

even  her  beggary  we  have  seen  something  of.  In  my  Prov- 
ident Association  we  relieved  more  than  two  thousand  poor 
families  in  the  single  month  of  January.  Prescott  has  had  a 
shock,  premonitory  of  what  may  still  be  postponed  some  years. 
We  cannot  afford  to  lose  his  sunny  face  and  genial  welcome. 
His  brother-in-law,  Franklin  Dexter  (a  very  old  friend  of 
mine),  died  last  autumn.  Everett  is  going  his  Washington 
circuit  again,  gathering  laurels  for  himself  and  money  for 
Mount  Vernon.  They  have  had  a  horrid  knock-down  and 
drag-out  affair  in  Congress  api^opos  of  Kansas.  I  shut  my 
eyes  and  ears  to  politics,  sick  of  the  very  sound  of  brawling 
and  bickering  about  slavery,  but  the  failing  health  of  my 
wife's  mother  renders  going  abroad,  for  the  present,  out  of 
the  question. 

[June  19.]  Greenough's  statue  of  Governor  Winthrop  at 
Mount  Auburn  is  perhaps  a  little  too  youthful  and  saint-like 
in  its  general  effect,  but  on  the  whole  a  successful  work.  I 
sat  for  the  hands,  at  his  request.  We  had  three  days  of 
drenching  rain  in  Philadelphia,  and  as  many  pleasant  ones  in 
New  York,  where  James  Lenox  showed  me  his  books  and 
pictures,  and  Peter  Cooper  his  Institute.  I  was  glad  to  escape 
'Anniversary  Week.'  So  much  of  abolition  and  sectional 
fanaticism  has  got  mixed  up  with  the  meetings  of  our  re- 
ligious and  charitable  associations  that  I  cannot  abide  them, 
though  in  old  times  I  used  not  a  little  to  value  such  opportu- 
nities of  saying  a  good  word.  We  are  going  to  Nahant  for 
the  rest  of  the  summer,  and  I  shall  attend  no  celebrations, 
political  or  otherwise,  in  spite  of  what  the  newspapers  say. 
To  my  great  astonishment,  President  Quincy  asked  me  whether 
I  did  not  intend  to  allow  myself  to  run  for  Congress  again 
this  autumn.  I  replied  that  I  had  had  too  many  years  of  that 
bondage  to  be  disposed  to  put  on  the  yoke  again.  I  can  im- 
agine nothing  I  should  dislike  more.  Yes,  one  thing,  —  the 
Presidency  of  Harvard.  I  have  been  not  a  little  annoyed  at 
a  revival  of  the  old  story  that  I  was  seriously  talked  of  for 
that  post.     Some  one  has  sent  me  a  Sandwich  'Advocate' 


202  A   MEMOIR  OF 

with  a  whole  column  of  my  qualifications.  A  newspaper  pro- 
posal to  run  me  for  Vice-President  with  Crittenden  two  years 
hence  is  more  congenial,  in  the  abstract.  There  is  no  Whig 
leader  left  for  whom  I  have  more  regard  than  for  him,  or 
whom  I  would  do  more  to  help,  —  but  he  is  seventy-one  years 
old,  none  too  strong,  and,  in  spite  of  what  Washington  Hunt 
writes,  I  see  no  hope  of  the  White  House  for  him.  President 
Quincy,  I  should  have  added,  also  surprised  me  by  the  mod- 
eration of  his  tone,  said  he  did  not  differ  from  me  so  much  as 
I  might  think,  and  that  he  was  no  approver  of  the  course  of 
certain  persons,  whom  he  characterized  as  monomaniacs,  but 
whose  names  I  do  not  mention,  as  he  expressed  a  wish  not  to 
be  quoted. 

[Oct.  22.]  How  are  you  going  to  vote  ?  Some  of  our  local 
Whigs  have  been  meeting  at  Parker's  and  getting  up  a  little 
manifesto,  proposing  a  resuscitation  of  a  National  Whig  party 
and  an  independent  stand  at  the  coming  State  election.  The 
address  was  sent  to  me  to  sign,  but  I  wrote  Hillard  that, 
while  I  should  probably  vote  as  advised,  I  a  little  preferred  to 
be  one  of  the  addressed  and  not  one  of  the  addressers.  Per- 
sonally, I  have  my  doubts.  I  suppose  there  is  no  question 
whatever  that  either  Banks  or  Beach  will  be  Governor,  and  I 
had  rather  vote  for  Beach  than  be  either  directly  or  indirectly 
responsible  for  the  continued  supremacy  of  Banks  &  Co. 
Nor  shall  I  hesitate  to  support  John  T.  Heard  in  preference 
to  Burlingame. 

When  his  intention  to  vote  for  the  Democratic  can- 
didate for  Congress  became  known,  he  was  urged  to 
preside  at  a  public  meeting  of  the  latter' s  supporters, 
without  distinction  of  party.  This  he  declined  to  do ; 
but  he  addressed  to  the  managing  committee  a  letter 
from  which  the  following  is  an  extract :  — 

I  had  desired  and  designed  to  keep  myself  aloof  from  poli- 
tics during  the  present  campaign.     But  observing  a  willing- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  203 

ness  in  some  quarters  to  draw  my  position  into  doubt,  owing 
to  the  absence  of  my  name  from  the  signatures  to  the  recent 
Whig  address,  I  cannot  hesitate  to  avow  the  intention  which 
I  long  ago  formed  in  regard  to  the  particular  subject  of  your 
meeting.  I  have  an  unchangeable  conviction  that  intemper- 
ate antislavery  agitation  has  been  a  source  of  a  very  large 
part  of  the  troubles  by  which  our  country  has  been  disturbed 
and  harassed  for  some  years  past ;  that  it  has  done  nothing 
to  advance  any  real  interest  of  freedom,  but  has  provoked  and 
stimulated  not  a  few  of  the  very  measures  against  which  it 
was  ostensibly  aimed ;  that  it  has  impeded  and  obstructed 
all  other  measures  for  the  prosperity  and  welfare  of  the 
people  ;  and  that  there  is  little  hope  of  any  useful  or  practical 
legislation  being  successfully  attempted  until  Congress  shall 
cease  to  be  a  mere  ring  for  the  prize-fights  of  proslavery  and 
antislaveiy  agitators.  It  is  for  the  highest  interest  of  the 
whole  country  that  there  should  be  an  end  of  this  sectional 
strife,  and  I  know  not  how  this  result  can  be  more  effectively 
promoted  than  by  granting  at  least  a  temporary  furlough  to 
those  of  the  combatants  who,  by  disposition,  or  principle,  or 
antecedent  circumstances  or  connections,  are  most  strongly 
inclined  to  prolong  and  aggravate  that  strife.  This  considera- 
tion alone  is  sufficient  to  determine  my  choice  between  the 
only  two  candidates  for  Congress  in  my  District,  and  it  is 
hardly  necessary  for  me  to  add  that  my  vote  will  be  given  for 
Colonel  Heard. 

On  the  night  of  the  State  election  (November  2),  when 
the  returns  sufficiently  indicated  a  Republican  victory, 
Henry  Wilson  made  a  triumphant  speech  on  the  steps 
of  the  Parker  House,  in  which  he  referred  to  the  above 
letter  as  follows :  — 

"  We  have  been  told  by  Mr.  Winthrop  that  he  wanted  to 
put  the  antislavery  agitators,  among  them  Mr.  Burlingame, 
on  the  retired  list.     He  wanted  to  give  him  a  furlough.     The 


204  A  MEMOIR   OF 

people  of  this  district  have  not  given  Mr.  Burlingame  a  fur- 
lough ;  but  the  people  of  Massachusetts  have  given  Mr.  Robert 
C.  Winthrop  a  perpetual  discharge !  {Loud  cheering.)  Gen- 
tlemen, we  have  ever  been  liberal  and  generous.  We  have 
invited  to  our  ranks  men  from  every  party.  We  have  given 
them  all  the  honors  we  could  bestow.  Over  and  over  agfain 
we  have  tendered  to  Mr.  Winthrop  our  support.  We  have 
offered  to  put  in  his  hands  our  banner :  he  has  scornfully 
turned  aside.  He  now  proposes  to  give  a  furlough  to  the  agi- 
tators, as  he  chooses  to  call  the  men  who  have  resisted  every 
demand  of  the  slave  power,  before  which  he  quailed,  and  for 
his  conduct  in  regard  to  which  the  people  of  this  State  have 
sent  him  into  perpetual  retirement." 

To  this  Mr.  Winthrop  made  no  public  rejoinder,  but 
he  alluded  to  it  in  a  private  letter  thus :  — 

[Nov.  6.]  I  did  not  vote  the  whole  Democratic  ticket,  and 
I  am  not  much  readier  than  you  are  to  indorse  the  entire 
policy  of  Buchanan  and  his  party.  Indeed,  I  could  not  go 
the  length  of  the  Whig  address,  which  declared  a  sweeping 
purpose  to  defeat  every  Republican  candidate  whatsoever, 
whether  moderate  or  radical.  As  to  Wilson's  anathemas, 
they  are  inconsistent,  to  say  the  least.  If  I  '  quailed,'  as  he 
says,  '  before  the  slave  power,'  surely  I  was  an  improper  per- 
son to  be  intrusted  with  his  '  banner.'  Aside  from  this,  it  is 
a  figure  of  speech  to  say  I  refused  '  scornfully.'  I  considered, 
and  still  consider,  his  offer  to  have  been  a  flattering  one. 
Had  I  been  a  soldier  of  fortune,  I  should  have  closed  with  it 
and  claimed  my  pay ;  but,  while  never  a  Conscience- Whig,  I 
have  always  been  troubled  with  a  conscience,  and  this,  Ken- 
nedy says,  is  the  worst  complaint  from  which  a  politician  can 
suffer.  I  have  sometimes  smiled  to  think  what  wry  faces 
would  have  been  visible  in  some  quarters  had  I  appeared 
booted  and  spurred  in  the  Republican  camp,  wielding  a  haton 
of  command.  I  should  have  received  a  warm  welcome  from 
some  old  friends,  but  I  could  never  have  satisfied  the  ultras. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  205 

I  was  born  a  Conservative ;  and  if  I  may  venture  to  compare 
myself  to  my  betters,  I  have  in  me  something  of  the  Hampden 
and  the  Falkland,  but  not  a  particle  of  the  Cromwell.  I  re- 
ceived from  anonymous  sources  several  savage  newspaper 
attacks  upon  my  letter,  but  two  leaders  in  the  New  York 
'  Tribune,'  though  a  little  ribald,  were  very  funny,  and  were 
doubtless  written  by  Congdon,  who  has  a  knack  at  such  things, 
though  he  will  never  do  anything  so  good  as  that  scathing 
article  on  Sumner  which  first  gave  him  celebrity.  Bob  writes 
me  from  Europe  that  he  accidentally  stumbled  on  an  old  New 
York  '  Herald,'  in  which  my  School  Festival  speech  of  last 
summer  (a  modest  little  mi Ik-and- watery  affair,  as  I  thought) 
was  a  good  deal  derided.  I  can  forgive  the  '  Herald '  this,  be- 
cause it  has  done  good  service  in  showing  up  Seward's  late 
utterances  at  Rome  and  Rochester.  They  are  the  most  signifi- 
cant things  of  the  day,  and  should  be  pondered  by  all  who  are 
halting  between  two  opinions. 

By  way  of  giving  both  sides,  I  here  insert  the  greater 
part  of  the  "  Tribune  "  articles  just  mentioned :  — 

"WiNTHEOP's  Last  Woed. 

"Amateur  patriotism  is,  abstractly  considered,  one  of  the 
most  fascinating  and  classical  of  virtues.  But  in  this  country 
amateur  patriotism  is  at  a  discount.  .  .  .  That  the  people 
of  the  Northern  States  —  educated,  thoughtful,  intelligent, 
honest,  and  religious  —  are  all  wrong,  and  that  Mr.  Robert 
C.  Winthrop,  of  Boston,  in  the  State  of  Massachusetts,  is 
all  right,  is  one  of  those  phenomena,  whether  regarded  as 
intellectual,  moral,  or  political,  which  fill  the  mind  with 
awe.  ...  Our  readers  may  remember  a  gentleman  of  the 
name  of  Robert  C.  Winthrop,  —  a  gentleman  who  lives  in 
a  very  genteel  square  in  a  very  genteel  locality  in  the 
very  genteel  city  of  Boston.  Quite  wp,  you  must  know; 
miles  away  from  vulgar  people ;  in  a  very  good  house  ; 
with  a  very  good  library;    and  good  pictures;    and  two 


206  A  MEMOIR   OF 

cloaks;  and  other  comfortable  things.  That  this  gentleman 
upon  the  eve  of  an  election  should  shuffle  himself  from 
his  genteel  shelf,  and  write  a  refined  letter  in  defence  of 
genteel  politics,  is  not  half  so  wonderful  as  that  he  should 
write  the  letter  aforesaid  to  Col.  Isaac  H.  Wright,  a  Mexi- 
can colonel  of  a  Massachusetts  regiment,  and  therefore  not, 
ex  officio^  a  genteel  personage.  But  Mr.  Winthrop  has  done 
it, — bless  his  honest  and  self-sacrificing  soul!  Was  this  a 
moment  for  etiquette  ?  A  glorious  Union  endangered,  —  the 
proud  fabric  of  our  political  liberties  shaking  as  with  a  shak- 
ing palsy,  —  was  this  a  moment  in  which  to  hesitate  ?  Not 
a  bit  of  it.  Mr.  Winthrop  jumped  out  of  bed,  where  he 
has  been  for  the  last  five  years.  Mr.  Winthrop  put  on  his 
dressing-gown ;  Mr.  Winthrop  grasped  his  best  pen ;  and 
Mr.  Winthrop  wrote  to  Colonel  Wright,  —  Colonel  Wright 
of  the  Mexican  army !  And  what  did  Mr.  Winthrop  write  ? 
Listen  to  his  words :  '  I  have  an  unchangeable  conviction 
that  intemperate  antislavery  agitation  has  been  the  source  of 
a  very  large  part  of  the  troubles  by  which  our  country  has 
been  disturbed  and  harassed  for  some  time  past ! '  What 
troubles,  O  Robert?  Financial,  religious,  or  political,  O  my 
Winthrop  ?  When  a  man  has  an  '  unchangeable  conviction,' 
it  should  be  about  something.  Take  off  your  nightcap,  0 
mio  Roherto  !  and  let  us  reason  together.  When  you  came 
into  public  life,  reverend  sir,  antislavery  principles  were  in 
fashion.  You  were  the  deciis  and  sixpenny  tutamen  of  your 
Whig  party.  Of  antislavery  opinions  you  were  wont  to  utter 
a  few,  not  many,  but  enough.  Think,  if  you  are  right 
now,  how  wrong  you  must  have  been  then !  Yours  was  of 
course  '  temperate '  agitation ;  but  did  it  not  pave  and  smooth 
and  level  the  way  for  the  '  intemperate '  ?  You  were  never 
very  warm;  but  you  were  never,  as  you  are  now,  happil}-, 
sweetly,  safely,  and  delightfully  refrigerant.  We  will  not 
look  too  closely  into  the  details  of  the  past.  You  bolted 
when  you  thought  it  best  to  bolt,  just  as  you  stuck  by  Free- 
dom and  Massachusetts  opinion  when  you  thought  it  best  to 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  207 

stick  by  them.  Are  you  moved,  my  Robert?  Try,  then,  to 
be  what  you  once  were.  Try  to  be  worthy  of  that  great  his- 
torical wealth  of  ancestry  which  is  yours.  You  cut  but  a 
sorry  figure  when  you  are  writing  to  such  folk  as  Mr.  Isaac 
H.  Wright,  colonel  and  auctioneer,  represents.  You  make 
us  think  of  the  Frenchman  in  the  basket,  midway  between 
heaven  and  earth,  as  described  in  a  novel  called  'Pelham.' 
You  will  never  have  a  good  digestion  and  a  sound  liver  until 
you  make  up  your  mind.  Do  so,  O  Robert,  and  write  to  us 
a  letter ! " 

"The  Result  in  Massachusetts. 

"  The  returns  from  Massachusetts  are  exceedingly  refresh- 
ing. The  Republicans  carry  everything.  Banks  is  re-elected 
Governor  by  over  30,000.  Amos  A.  Lawrence,  the  'American' 
candidate,  is  left  so  dismally  out  in  the  cold  that  he  will  one 
day  be  obliged  to  procure  affidavits  that  he  w^as  ever  a  candi- 
date at  all.  There  is  little  necessity  for  recapitulating  the 
details.  Rather  be  it  our  pleasing  task  to  wipe  the  tears  from 
the  eyes  of  the  mourners,  to  pour  oil  into  their  wounds,  and 
to  bid  them,  as  citizens,  as  Christians,  as  patriots,  to  be- 
ware of  suicide.  The  party-colored  combination  of  Venerable 
Whigs,  of  Democrats  not  at  all  venerable,  of  all  the  sick  and 
the  sour,  the  halt  and  the  blind,  of  the  fretful,  the  fussy,  and 
the  nervous,  is  in  a  most  distressing  condition.  Here  has 
been  a  desperate  effort  to  rescue  Massachusetts  from  the 
Philistines.  Money  has  been  spent.  But  why  should  we 
talk  of  filthy  lucre  ?  Talent,  intellectual  vigor,  classical 
knowledge,  sublime  self-sacrifice,  and  the  Boston  'Courier,' 
have  all  been  thrown  away.  It  has  been  proved  over  and 
over  again,  to  the  satisfaction  of  everybody  except  about 
seventy  thousand  voters,  that  unless  Massachusetts  gives  up 
her  nonsensical  philanthropy,  her  expensive  honesty,  her  ridi- 
culous love  of  right,  and  her  stupendously  foolish  hatred  of 
wrong,  the  dome  of  the  State  House  would  fall  in,  crushing 
the  statue  of  Washington  by  Chantrey,  and  the  stuffed  cod- 


208  A  MEMOIR   OF 

fish  in  Representatives  Hall  by  an  unknown  artist,  burying  a 
considerable  portion  of  Beacon  Street  under  the  ruins,  and 
filling  up  forever  the  Frog  Pond  on  the  Common.  To  avert 
this  dire  catastrophe,  Mr.  Robert  C.  Winthrop  wrote  the  cele- 
brated and  vigorous  epistle  to  which  we  have  already  given 
immortality.  To  avert  this,  Mr.  Rufus  Choate,  by  particular 
desire  of  his  party,  by  a  resolute,  praiseworthy,  and  almost 
incomprehensible  effort,  refrained  from  making  any  speeches 
during  the  campaign.  To  avert  this,  sundry  solid  citizens 
unbuttoned  their  pockets,  took  out  their  pocket-books,  and 
planked  their  money  without  a  groan.  Ben  Hallett  —  to  give 
a  single  instance  of  the  astonishing  'pot-pourri  —  figured  for 
one  night  only  upon  the  same  platform  with  Prof.  Benjamin 
Peirce  of  the  august  University  of  Harvard,  who  saw  on 
Sunday  more  stars  than  he  ever  saw  before  ;  Isaac  H.  Wright^ 
the  Mexican  brave;  and  Charles  Theodore  Russell,  whose 
middle  name  affords  the  only  indication  that  he  is  the  gift 
of  God! 

"  Alas,  that  we  should  be  compelled  to  record  the  failure 
of  so  much  gallantry,  self-sacrifice,  letter-writing,  and  speech- 
making!  That  lavender-scented  aristocrats  should  get  into 
bed  with  malodorous  loafers ;  that  nice  nobility,  with  un- 
plugged nostrils,  should  meander  in  mud  and  perambulate 
the  dangerous  districts  to  the  utter  ruin  of  its  varnished 
boots ;  that  Demosthenes,  Hyperides,  Cicero,  Pitt,  and  Can- 
ning (these  eminent  men  still  live  in  Boston,  although  popu- 
larly supposed  by  the  rest  of  the  world  to  be  dead)  should 
pour  forth  floods  of  eloquence  ;  that  George  Lunt,  the  modern 
Junius,  should  write  some  hundreds  of  columns  awful  to  look 
upon,  and  still  more  awful  to  read,  —  and  all  in  vain  !  We 
are  going  to  ruin,  and  no  mistake !  We  see  the  '  demnition 
bow-wows'  in  the  distance.  We  see  the  vortex,  the  mael- 
strom, the  eddies,  the  quicksands,  the  rocks,  the  breakers. 
'  Man  the  lifeboat ! '  should  be  upon  every  white  and 
trembling  lip  in  Boston  and  the  demesnes  adjacent.  For 
Church  is   nodding   to   State,   and   State    is   returning   the 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  209 

compliment.      Respectability  has  retired  for  the  purpose  of 

committing  felo  de  se.      The  Boston  '  Courier '  alone  stands 

firm. 

'  We  a  little  longer  wait ; 
But  how  little  none  can  know  1 ' 

"It  may  be  uncivil,  and  even  brutal,  for  us  to  indulge 
in  the  language  of  exultation.  But  oui*  opinion  being  that 
Massachusetts  Hunkerism  is  nine-tenths  dead,  we  beg  pardon 
of  the  fraction  still  living  while  we  say  that  the  Massachusetts 
Republicans  have  done  nobly.  They  have  not  merely  con- 
quered, but  they  have  conquered  wisely.  The  returns  show 
that  they  are  not  merely  powerful  numerically,  but  that  they 
are  fast  becoming  powerful  morally.  The  Dark  Lantern 
candle  has  ceased  to  smoulder,  —  it  has  even  ceased  to  smell ; 
for  which  we,  even  at  this  distance  of  three  hundred  miles, 
are  sufficiently  grateful." 

On  the  7th  of  April,  1859,  Mr.  Winthrop  delivered 
before  the  Young  Men's  Christian  Association  of  Boston 
a  long  and  elaborate  address  entitled  "  Christianity, 
neither  Sectarian  nor  Sectional,  the  Great  Remedy  for 
Social  and  Political  Evils;"  and  on  the  13th  of  May, 
in  the  Boston  Music  Hall,  a  lecture  on  "  Luxury  and 
the  Fine  Arts,"  in  aid  of  the  fund  for  Ball's  equestrian 
statue  of  Washington.^ 

[April  11.]  I  labored  hard  over  what  you  call  my  first 
sermon ;  and  if  I  ever  tried  to  do  good  in  my  life,  it  was  in 
that  effort.  I  am  conscious  of  having  made  a  deep  impression, 
and  of  having  exerted  a  greater  amount  of  immediate  power 
upon  my  audience  than  perhaps  ever  before.    Hillard,  Felton, 

^  The  former  of  these  two  addresses  was  also  delivered  in  Richmond, 
Virginia,  the  latter  in  Baltimore ;  but  he  declined  invitations  to  repeat 
them  in  other  parts  of  the  country  because  he  found  that  the  repetition 
of  his  own  productions  palled  upon  him.  "It  is  difficult  [he  wrote]  to 
get  up  the  requisite  vim  a  second  time.  I  envy  Everett  his  unrivalled 
faculty  in  this  respect." 

14 


210  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Joel  Parker,  Dr.  Frothingham,  and  Chandler  Robbins  were 
among  the  most  earnest  and  cordial  of  my  congratulators, 
while  Dr.  Blagden  and  my  own  assistant  rector,  Cotton 
Smith,  applauded  to  the  echo.  So  you  see  I  could  not  have 
been  very  illiberal,  or  very  loose,  in  mj  theology.  Some  one 
has  sent  me  two  different  numbers  of  the  New  York  '  Journal 
of  Commerce '  containing  verj^  glowing  compliments  from  a 
writer  who  appears  to  have  been  present.  I  have  more  than 
once  had  misgivings  that  I  mistook  my  vocation.  My  brother 
William  (much  my  senior  and  the  flower  of  our  family)  of  his 
own  accord  studied  for  the  ministry,  and  it  was  a  grief  to  my 
mother  that  he  did  not  live  to  be  ordained.  In  her  last  ill- 
ness (I  was  then  a  Sophomore)  she  expressed  a  hope  that, 
after  graduating,  I  would  follow  his  example,  if  the  way 
seemed  clear  before  me,  which  it  did  not.  I  was  ambitious 
then,  with  a  temperament  ill  suited  to  a  round  of  parish  duties ; 
but  I  have  since  felt  that  in  the  pulpit  I  might  gradually 
have  become  an  influence  for  good  beside  wliich  all  other 
successes  of  my  life  would  have  been  paltry.  At  all  events, 
I  should  not  have  preached  politics  or  transcendentalism. 

[May  12.]  My  fiftieth  anniversary !  I  had  three  delight- 
ful days  with  Kennedy  in  Baltimore,  three  more  with  Rives 
at  Castle  Hill,  and  my  addresses  in  Richmond  and  Baltimore 
were  delivered  to  full  and  appreciative  houses.  Our  long- 
deferred  trip  to  Europe  is  now  practically  settled,  and  we 
expect  to  sail  next  month.  Before  going,  I  shall  resign  my 
vice-presidency  of  the  Tract  Society  here.  I  wrote  Seth 
Bliss  more  than  a  year  ago  that  antislavery  essays  did  not 
rightfully  enter  into  our  province,  and  would  be  fatal  to  the 
unity  and  usefulness  of  the  Society.  I  now  feel  even  more 
strongly  on  this  subject,  and  believe  that  such  publications 
only  inflame  the  Southern  mind,  and  retard  the  very  reforms 
they  are  intended  to  promote.  They  undoubtedly  contain 
a  great  deal  of  abstract  truth;  but  one  cannot  expect  the 
Southern  people  to  consider  abstract  truths  when  they  are 
continually  made  the  subject  of  outrageous  tirades  in  North- 


I 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  211 

ern  newspapers.  I  have  always  held  that  the  great  problem 
of  American  slavery  should  be  approached  in  a  serious  and 
solemn  spirit,  not  in  violence  and  vituperation.  It  is  no 
answer  to  say  that  Southern  newspapers  are  often  equally 
vituperative.  They  are  a  hot-blooded  race,  and  their  property 
is  at  stake.  I  wonder  how  we  should  feel  if  our  property 
was  at  stake,  here  in  New  England.  If  civil  war  comes,  we 
shall  lose  many  brave  men  in  the  field,  but  our  homes  are  too 
far  away  to  be  reached  by  the  enemy,  and  our  mills  will 
undoubtedly  make  money  by  army  contracts.  I  abhor  the 
prospect  of  great  fortunes  so  acquired. 

Mr.  Winthrop's  second  visit  to  Europe  lasted  about 
fifteen  months ;  and  though  at  times  clouded  by  news 
of  family  bereavements  and  by  serious  illnesses  of 
members  of  his  party,  yet  he  greatly  enjoyed  the  oppor- 
tunities afforded  him  of  meeting  old  friends^  of  making 
new  ones,  and  of  visiting  famous  countries  he  had  never 
seen.  Among  other  interesting  experiences,  he  had  a 
private  audience  of  Pius  IX.  in  the  Vatican,  and  a 
pleasant  hour  with  Cavour  in  the  Foreign  Office  in 
Turin,  on  both  which  occasions  those  eminent  Italians 
discussed  public  affairs  with  a  good  deal  of  freedom. 
At  Vienna,  in  the  autumn  of  1859,  he  stumbled  upon 
Senator  Seward,  fresh  from  the  Holy  Land,  and  together 
they  had  a  private  audience  of  the  Emperor  Francis 
Joseph,  and  longer  interviews  with  leading  Austrian 
statesmen.  Mr.  Winthrop  and  Mr.  Seward  were  not 
extravagant  admirers  of  each  other's  political  course, 
but  their  personal  relations  had  always  been  amicable, 
and  they  now  had  many  long  talks  upon  the  state  of 
things  at  home,  when  Mr.  Seward's  cheerful  optimism 
was  exhibited  in  marked  contrast  to  Mr.  Winthrop's 
pervading  dread  of  civil  war.     The  latter  shared  the 


212  A  MEMOIR   OF 

prevailing  impression  that  Seward  would  receive  the 
Republican  nomination  for  the  Presidency  in  the  fol- 
lowing summer,  and  he  thought  him  fairly  entitled 
to  it,  though  he  subsequently  made  up  his  mind  that 
Abraham  Lincoln  was  the  abler  man  of  the  two  and 
the  more  adroit  political  manager.  Before  his  return 
home,  Mr.  Winthrop  received  from  President  Buchanan 
a  commission  to  represent  the  United  States  at  the 
Statistical  Congress  in  London,  but  his  engagements 
on  the  Continent  prevented  him  from  accepting  it. 

[Boston,  Oct.  1,  I860.]  I  got  home  not  feeling  very  well, 
with  a  thousand  matters  to  attend  to  and  no  relish  for  speech- 
making,  but  I  made  a  point  of  making  public  adhesion  to  the 
National  Union  nominations,  and  my  remarks  seem  to  have 
been  appreciated  by  our  friends.  The  great  game  of  Sumner, 
Wilson,  and  Co.  is  to  show  up  John  Bell's  record  and  make  him 
out  an  ultra  proslavery  man.  I  spiked  one  of  their  guns  by 
pointing  out  that  if  he  voted  against  the  abolition  of  slavery 
in  the  District  of  Columbia,  so  did  Abraham  Lincoln.  I  am 
told  there  has  been  published  at  the  South  a  Breckinridge 
pamphlet  proving  both  Bell  and  Everett  to  be  downright 
Free-Soilers.  Try,  if  you  can,  to  procure  for  me  a  copy  of  it, 
and  I  will  file  it  with  a  Charleston  '  Mercury  '  I  received  in 
Europe,  which  spurned  the  idea  of  there  being  any  real  Con- 
servatism at  the  North,  and  singled  me  out  as  an  'Abolitionist 
in  disguise,'  —  a  charge  which  carried  me  back  to  the  contest 
for  the  Speakership.  This  time  it  was  probably  in  answer  to  a 
droll  suggestion  in  a  Texas  paper  that  I  should  run  for  Vice- 
President  with  Sam  Houston.  If  Lincoln  be  chosen,  which 
seems  not  unlikely,  you  and  I  must  do  what  we  can  to  pre- 
vent mischief,  but  I  fear  there  will  be  more  than  we  or  any- 
body else  can  manage.  I  believe  him  to  be  at  heart  a  mod- 
erate man ;  and  if  Southern  Senators  and  Representatives 
would  only  keep  their  tempers,  things  might  not  go  along  as 


EGBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  213 

badly  as  they  fear.     The  danger  is  that,  in  the  first  flush  of 
such  an  election,  madness  will  rule  the  hour. 

The  speech  alluded  to  in  the  foregoing  letter  was 
made  by  Mr.  Winthrop  in  the  Boston  Music  Hall,  Sept. 
25,  1860.  In  it,  after  paying  a  warm  tribute  to  John 
Bell  and  Edward  Everett,  he  spoke  of  Mr.  Lincoln  with 
kindness  and  appreciation.  I  quote  a  single  passage  on 
another  subject :  — 

I  shall  not  soon  forget  the  emotions  with  which  I  received 
at  Vienna,  last  November,  the  first  tidings  of  that  atrocious 
affair  at  Harper's  Ferry.  They  came  in  the  form  of  a  brief 
telegraphic  despatch,  without  details,  without  explanations, 
simply  announcing  that  an  armed  and  organized  band  of  abo- 
lition conspirators  had  taken  forcible  possession  of  a  National 
Arsenal,  in  furtherance  of  a  concerted  insurrection  of  the 
blacks,  and  that  blood  had  already  begun  to  flow.  I  think 
there  could  have  been  no  true  American  heart  in  Europe  at 
that  moment- that  did  not  throb  and  thrill  with  horror  at  that 
announcement.  But  I  confess  to  have  experienced  emotions 
hardly  less  deep  or  distressing,  when  I  read,  not  long  after- 
wards, an  account  of  a  meeting  —  in  this  very  hall,  I  believe 
—  at  which  the  gallows  at  Charlestown,  in  Virginia,  was 
likened  to  the  Cross  of  Calvary,  and  at  which  it  was  openly 
declared  that  the  ringleader  of  that  desperate  and  wicked 
conspiracy  was  right.  Sir,  if  it  had  been  suggested  to  me 
then  that  before  another  year  had  passed  away,  the  presiding 
officer  of  that  meeting  would  have  been  deliberately  nomi- 
nated by  the  Republican  party  of  Massachusetts  for  the  Chief 
Magistracy  of  the  Commonwealth,  I  should  have  repelled  the 
idea  as  not  within  the  prospect  of  belief,  —  as  utterly  trans- 
cending any  pitch  of  extravagance  which  even  the  wildest 
and  most  ultra  members  of  that  party  had  ever  prepared  us  to 
anticipate.  But  the  nomination  is  before  us.  The  candidate, 
I  am  told,  is  a  most  amiable  and  respectable  gentleman,  and 


214  A   MEMOIR   OF 

I  have  no  wish  to  say  an  unkind  word  of  him  or  of  those  who 
indorse  him.  But  I  should  be  false  to  every  impulse  of  my 
heart,  if  being  here  at  all  this  evening,  if  opening  my  lips  at 
all  during  this  campaign,  I  did  not  enter  my  humble  protest, 
—  as  one  to  whom  the  cause  of  Christianity  and  of  social 
order  is  dear,  as  one  who  would  see  the  Word  of  God  and  the 
laws  of  the  land  respected  and  obeyed,  —  if  I  did  not  enter 
my  earnest  protest  against  such  an  attempt  to  give  the  seem- 
ing sanction  of  the  people  of  Massachusetts  to  sentiments  so 
impious  and  so  abominable. 

The  echoes  of  this  momentous  general  election  had 
hardly  subsided  before  Mr.  Winthrop  again  found  him- 
self under  the  impending  shadow  of  a  great  domestic 
sorrow.  His  wife  had  experienced  in  Europe  a  trouble- 
some a:ffection  of  the  eye,  but  she  now  began  to  develop 
disquieting  symptoms  of  an  internal  malady  which  in 
the  following  spring  proved  fatal.  Her  health,  how- 
ever, declined  slowly,  and  he  endeavored  to  distract  his 
thoughts  by  anxious  consideration  of  the  critical  condition 
of  the  country.  His  hurried  diary  mentions  repeated  con- 
sultations in  Mr.  Everett's  library,  where  were  sometimes 
present  such  men  as  Nathan  and  William  Appleton, 
Joseph  Grinnell,  John  H.  Clifford,  Peleg  Sprague,  Jacob 
Bigelow,  George  Ticknor,  and  Benjamin  R.  Curtis, — 
correspondence  with  Crittenden,  Rives,  and  other  friends 
in  Border  States,  or  with  moderate  men  of  different  par- 
ties in  other  parts  of  the  country,  —  all  in  the  hope  of 
devising  some  scheme  for  the  peaceful  preservation  of 
the  Union.  On  the  23d  of  January,  1861,  Mr.  Everett 
and  he  started  for  Washington,  heading  the  delegation 
in  charge  of  the  great  Boston  petition  for  a  Compromise, 
signed  by  nearly  15,000  legal  voters,  a  petition  forcibly, 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  215 

if  irreverently,  described  by  Mr.  Sumner  as  "  mere 
wind,  —  nothing  better  than  a  penny-whistle  in  a 
tempest."  I  find  among  Mr.  Winthrop's  papers  memo- 
randa of  conversations  he  then  had  at  the  capital  with 
public  men  of  all  shades  of  opinion  —  among  them 
President  Buchanan,  ex-President  Tyler,  Vice-President 
Breckinridge,  Generals  Scott  and  Cass,  Mr.  Justice  Mc- 
Lean, Senators  Pearce,  Seward,  Douglas,  Mason,  Hunter, 
Wilson  and  Slidell,  together  with  many  members  of  the 
House,  including  Charles  Francis  Adams,  with  whose 
moderate  statesmanlike  course,  as  he  considered  it,  at 
this  juncture,  Mr.  Winthrop  was  greatly  pleased,  and  all 
the  more  so  because  he  had  differed  very  widely  from 
him  in  the  past.^ 

Seward,  too,  showed,  he  thought,  a  conciliatory  spirit, 
but,  on  the  whole,  he  returned  to  Boston  greatly  dis- 
heartened, feeling  that  the  extreme  men  of  both  sections 
were  bent  on  precipitating  disunion  and  likely  to  have 
their  way.  In  a  published  letter  of  the  19th  of  February 
excusing  himself  from  accepting  an  invitation  to  speak 
at  a  great  Union  meeting  at  Troy,  N.  Y.,  he  wrote  : 

The  newly  elected  President  is  passing  through  your  city 
while  I  write,  on  his  way  to  the  national  capital.  He  must 
be  more  or  less  than  man  if  he  does  not  feel  deeply  the  weight 
of  responsibility  which  rests  upon  him.  Let  him  not  fail  to  be 
assured  that  from  us  who  have  voted  against  him,  as  from 
those  who  have  voted  for  him,  he  may  confidently  rely  on  a 

1  I  find  among  his  papers  a  newspaper  report  of  a  speech  of  Mr. 
Blame's  in  Cincinnati  long  afterward,  in  which  Mr.  Adams  is  charged 
with  having  been  guilty  of  both  cowardice  and  treason  in  the  winter  of 
1861,  and  with  having  excited  in  the  mind  of  Abraham  Lincoln  a  ''thrill 
of  horror."  To  this  Mr.  Winthrop  has  added,  "  I  do  not  believe  such  an 
assertion  would  have  been  ventured  had  Lincoln  been  still  living.'* 


216  A  mf:moir  of 

generous  sympathy  and  support  in  every  just  and  reasonable 
measure  which  he  may  adopt,  to  maintain  the  Constitution  of 
the  country.  If  we  can  do  little  to  strengthen  the  arm  of 
authority  at  a  moment  like  this,  let  us  be  careful  to  do  nothing 
to  weaken  it  by  any  poor  partisan  opposition.  Let  us  hope 
that  he  will  adopt  a  policy  which  will  enable  us  to  rally 
around  him  without  reserve,  in  upholding  the  government 
over  which  he  has  been  called  to  preside.  Let  us  hope  that 
he  will  take  counsel  of  moderate  and  forbearing  men,  —  of 
men  of  more  than  one  idea ;  of  men  who  will  prefer  a  united 
country  to  a  united  party ;  of  men  who  had  rather  be  found 
inconsistent  with  themselves  than  inconsistent  with  the  safety 
of  the  Republic. 

Early  in  March  his  wife's  condition  became  more 
critical,  and  after  prolonged  suffering,  borne  with  un- 
failing patience  and  thought  for  others,  she  died  on  the 
26th  of  April,  1861,  shortly  after  the  surrender  of  Fort 
Sumter.  Like  so  many  other  men,  in  early  life  he  had 
occasionally  tried  his  hand  at  verse,  and  though  he  soon 
became  convinced  that  nature  had  not  intended  him  for 
a  poet,  yet  now  and  then  in  leisure  hours  —  more  par- 
ticularly in  hours  of  sorrow  —  his  thoughts  would  some- 
times find  expression  in  a  hymn,  a  sonnet,  or  a  metrical 
translation.  He  had  never  been  sufficiently  satisfied 
with  any  one  of  these  effusions  to  allow  it  to  go  into 
print,  -but  towards  the  close  of  this  summer,  having 
written  a  patriotic  hymn  for  the  National  Fast,  it 
occurred  to  him  to  send  it  anonymously  to  a  newspaper 
and  see  what  became  of  it.  He  was  agreeably  surprised 
to  find  it  reproduced  in  different  parts  of  the  country 
with  words  of  commendation,  and  as  it  has  never  been 
included  in  his  works,  I  here  insert  it :  — 


EGBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  ,    217 

HYMN  FOR  THE  NATIONAL  FAST. 
September  26,  1861. 

With  humbled  hearts,  great  God,  this  day, 

Before  Thy  throne  we  sorrowing  stand ; 
Oh,  hear  our  prayer,  forgive  our  sins. 

And  turn  Thy  judgments  from  our  land. 

Our  fathers  placed  their  trust  in  Thee, 

And  Thou  didst  lead  them  like  a  flock ; 
Through  Thee  they  stemmed  the  wintry  waves, 

Through  Thee  they  braved  the  battle's  shock. 

Be  to  the  sons  once  more,  O  God, 

As  to  their  sires  Thou  wert  so  long ; 
Revive  our  faith,  rebuke  our  fears. 

And  let  us  in  Thy  might  be  strong. 

The  clouds  which  thicken  o'er  our  path, 

'T  is  Thine  alone  to  chase  away  ; 
Oh,  show  the  brightness  of  Thy  face. 

And  turn  our  darkness  into  day ! 

Pour  forth  Thy  Spirit,  gracious  Lord, 

To  help  us  in  this  hour  of  need ; 
Appease  the  rage  which  rends  our  land, 

And  bid  its  wounds  no  longer  bleed. 

In  vain  we  burnish  sword  or  shield. 

Without  a  blessing  from  on  high  ; 
If  radiant  with  no  smile  from  Thee, 

In  vain  our  banners  sweep  the  sky. 

Give  counsel  to  our  chosen  chiefs. 

Give  courage  to  our  marshaU'd  bands ; 
Let  prayer  and  faith  and  trust  in  God 

Inflame  their  hearts  and  nerve  their  hands ! 

In  no  resentment  let  them  strike ; 

No  hatred  stain  their  holy  cause ; 
But  consecrated  be  each  arm 

To  Union,  Freedom,  and  the  Laws ! 


218  A  MEMOIR   OF 

And,  oh,  in  Thine  own  time,  restore 
Good-will  and  peace  from  sea  to  sea ; 

And  in  each  brother's  breast  revive 

The  love  that  springs  from  love  to  Thee ! 

So  may  our  land,  from  danger  freed, 

AYith  one  consent  Thy  mercy  own ; 
And  every  knee  and  heart  be  bent 

In  grateful  homage  at  Thy  throne. 

'  Not  unto  us,  not  unto  us,'  — 

In  joyful  chorus  then  we  '11  sing,  — 
*  But  all  the  glory,  all  the  praise, 

Be  unto  Thee,  our  God  and  King!  * 

It  was  a  favorite  idea  of  his  that  the  real  purpose 
of  such  services  is  often  misconceived,  and  in  one  of 
the  commonplace  books  in  which  he  sometimes  jotted 
down  opinions  of  men  and  things,  I  find  the  following 
reflections :  — 

Not  a  few  of  the  clergy  appear  to  mistake  the  character  and 
object  of  a  National  Fast.  Their  sermons  often  seem  to  indi- 
cate that  such  a  day  had  been  appointed  in  order  to  enable 
them  to  open  the  flood-gates  of  pulpit  politics,  —  that  they 
might  discuss  the  condition  of  public  affairs  and  give  us  the 
benefit  of  their  counsel.  Nothing  could  be  farther,  in  my 
judgment,  from  the  true  design  and  use  of  these  occasions. 
If  an  earthquake  had  laid  a  city  (like  Lisbon)  in  ruins,  and  a 
fast  had  been  proclaimed,  it  would  not  be  the  province  of 
the  clergy  to  give  discourses  on  the  history  and  origin  of 
earthquakes.  If  the  cholera,  or  some  new  cohort  {nova  cohors, 
Hor.)  of  fevers  were  sweeping  over  the  land,  and  a  day  of 
humiliation  and  prayer  were  proclaimed,  the  clergy  would  not 
be  called  on  to  give  us  a  diagnosis  of  the  disease,  or  to  discuss 
the  difPerent  modes  of  treating  it.  And  so,  to  my  mind,  it 
seems  greatly  out  of  place  for  the  pulpit  to  be  employed  on 
such  a  day  in  treating  of  the  nature  and  causes  of  our  politi- 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  219 

cal  troubles.  The  one  great  idea  should  be  a  nation  on  its 
knees,  acknowledging  its  own  sins,  confessing  the  impotence 
of  all  human  wisdom  for  such  an  emergency,  and  imploring 
the  Divine  aid.  We  boasted  of  our  independence  so  long 
that  we  almost  began  to  imagine  ourselves  independent  of 
God.  Such  a  day  should  inculcate  the  doctrine  of  subordina- 
tion to  Divine  Government  and  dependence  on  Divine  protec- 
tion. There  is  a  worse  sort  of  secession  than  that  from  any 
human  authority  or  any  earthly  union,  and  there  has  been  too 
much  evidence  in  our  recent  national  career  that  a  presump- 
tuous self-reliance  was  usurping  the  place  of  that  old  trust  in 
God  which  characterized  the  founders  of  our  Republic. 

The  Civil  War  which  Mr.  Winthrop  had  foreboded 
was  now  in  full  blast,  and  his  position  with  regard  to  it 
was  briefly  this.  Although  he  had  always  scouted  the 
doctrines  of  secession,  he  was  a  believer  in  that  abstract 
right  of  Kevolution  so  succinctly  set  forth  by  Abraham 
Lincoln  in  his  celebrated  speech  in  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives, Jan.  12,  1848  :  — 

"  Any  people  anywhere,  being  inclined  and  having  the 
power,  have  the  right  to  rise  up  and  shake  off  the  existing 
government,  and  form  a  new  one  that  suits  them  better.  .  .  . 
Nor  is  this  right  confined  to  cases  in  which  the  whole  people 
of  an  existing  government  may  choose  to  exercise  it.  Any 
portion  of  such  people  that  can,  may  revolutionize  and  make 
their  own  of  so  much  of  the  territory  as  they  inhabit.  More 
than  this,  a  majority  of  any  portion  of  such  people  may  revo- 
lutionize, putting  down  a  minority  mingled  with  or  near  about 
them,  who  may  oppose  their  movements." 

In  conformity  to  this  general  view,  Mr.  Winthrop 
considered  the  Southern  people  fully  entitled  to  try  to 
achieve  their  independence  if  they  saw  fit ;  but  he  be- 
lieved them  profoundly  mistaken  in  thinking  that  such 


220  A  MEMOIR   OF 

a  step,  even  if  successful,  would  be  for  their  advantage ; 
while,  if  unsuccessful,  it  legitimately  involved,  in  his 
opinion,  not  merely  loss  of  life,  but  confiscation  of 
property  and  condign  punishment.  He  was  equally 
clear  that  it  was  the  bounden  duty  of  President  Lin- 
coln to  vindicate  the  authority  of  the  general  govern- 
ment, and  alike  the  duty  and  the  interest  of  the 
Northern  people  to  support  him  energetically  in  main- 
taining the  Constitution  and  the  laws.  For  any  attempt, 
however,  direct  or  indirect,  to  convert  a  war  for  the 
Constitution  and  the  Union  into  an  Emancipation  Cru- 
sade, he  had  no  feeling  but  that  of  reprobation.  On  the 
8th  of  October,  at  the  desire  of  Senator  Wilson,  and  at 
the  particular  request  of  some  of  the  latter' s  friends  who 
had  procured  a  standard  for  his  regiment  (the  Twenty- 
Second  Massachusetts),  Mr.  Winthrop  presented  this 
standard  to  that  regiment  on  Boston  Common,  and 
made  a  patriotic  speech  entitled  "  The  Flag  of  the 
Union,"  part  of  which  was  long  familiar  to  schoolboys.-^ 
At  its  close.  Senator  Sumner,  who  was  among  his  audi- 
ence, came  forward  and  offered  his  hand,  which  Mr. 
Winthrop  took,  and  so  ended  a  memorable  feud  of  more 
than  sixteen  years'  duration.^  Not  long  afterward  he 
received  a  letter  from  Secretary  Seward  asking  him  to 

^  The  Providence  "  Journal "  printed  this  speech  with  the  heading, 
"  Dawn  of  the  Millennium  :  Robert  C.  Winthrop  presents  a  standard  to 
Henry  Wilson !  " 

2  If  Mr.  Winthrop  did  not  always  find  it  easy  to  forget,  he  liked  to 
forgive  and  be  forgiven.  He  had  previously  "  made  up  "  with  Andrew 
Johnson  and  Robert  Toombs,  who,  in  the  mean  time,  had  conceived  a 
furious  dislike  of  each  other.  Of  the  three  (Sumner,  Johnson,  and 
Toombs),  the  one  most  congenial  to  him  socially,  in  spite  of  all  that 
had  passed,  was  the  last-named,  whose  reported  boast  that  he  would  one 
day  call  the  roll  of  his  slaves  on  Bunker  Hill  is  one  of  those  legends  fab- 
ricated in  the  ante-bellvm  period  in  order  "  to  fire  the  Northern  heart." 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  221 

come  to  Washington  on  public  business,  which  he  forth- 
with did,  and  found  that  a  scheme  was  on  foot  for 
sending  abroad,  at  the  expense  of  the  government,  a  few 
gentlemen  whose  names  were  well  known,  in  order  that 
they  might  mingle  with  leading  men  in  London  and 
Paris,  and  counteract,  if  possible,  the  influence  of  South- 
ern emissaries,  who  were  known  to  be  very  active.  Five 
gentlemen,  including  Mr.  Winthrop,  were  originally 
offered  these  positions,  the  others  being  Mr.  Everett, 
Mr.  John  P.  Kennedy,  Archbishop  Hughes  of  New  York, 
and  Bishop  Mcllvaine  of  Ohio.  Upon  this  subject  Mr. 
Winthrop  had  several  conversations  with  Mr.  Seward 
and  a  long  one  with  President  Lincoln ;  and  though  he 
expressed  an  entire  willingness  to  go  if  the  latter  really 
wished  him  to  do  so,  yet  his  inclination  was  decidedly 
against  it,  partly  owing  to  his  recent  domestic  affliction, 
partly  from  a  feeling  that  the  quasi-official  position 
of  such  agents  might  not  be  wholly  agreeable  to  our 
accredited  ministers  to  England  and  France.  Li  this 
latter  view  both  Mr.  Everett  and  Mr.  Kennedy  con- 
curred; and  as,  just  at  this  time,  Mr.  Seward  received 
more  encouraging  news  from  Europe,  the  project  was 
temporarily  withdrawn,  though,  in  the  following  month, 
Archbishop  Hughes  and  Bishop  Mcllvaine  went  out.^ 
Mr.  Winthrop  has  left  notes,  taken  at  the  time,  of 
this  trip  to  Washington,  with  memoranda  of  conver- 
sations with  General  Scott,  General  Robert  Anderson, 
Attorney-General  Bates,  Mr.  Secretary  Chase,  Mr.  Jus- 

^  In  the  first  volume  of  the  second  series  of  the  Proceedings  of  this 
Society  (pp.  202-210)  will  be  found  a  longer  account  of  the  matter, 
communicated  by  Mr.  Winthrop  in  1884,  in  consequence  of  certain  in- 
accuracies in  the  Autobiography  of  Thurlow  Weed  published  after  the 
latter's  death. 


222  A  MEMOIR  OF 

tice  Wayne,  Lord  Lyons,  and  others.  In  a  conversation 
with  President  Lincoln  upon  another  subject,  the  latter 
read  to  him  a  confidential  letter  he  had  just  finished, 
vindicating  the  course  he  had  pursued  with  reference 
to  General  Fremont's  abolition  proclamation ;  and  when 
Mr.  Winthrop  expressed  his  cordial  approbation  of  its 
tone,  Mr.  Lincoln  remarked  dryly,  ''There  is  a  good 
deal  of  old  Whig  left  in  me  yet." 

[Dec.  3,  1861.]  I  never  wake  up  in  the  morning  nowa- 
days  without  asking  what  I  can  do  for  my  country,  but  I 
rarely  get  a  satisfactory  answer.  .  .  .  When  you  see  the 
President  tell  him  the  only  satisfaction  I  have  had  for  a  month 
past  has  been  in  reading  his  calm,  plain,  and  excellent  mes- 
sage, full  of  wisdom  and  moderation,  and  a  welcome  rebuke 
to  the  extravagance  of  some  of  his  friends.  How  Petigru 
looms  up  above  the  standard  of  common  heroes  I  I  had  a 
noble  letter  from  him  before  the  mails  were  cut  off.  Mason 
and  Slidell  have  only  themselves  to  thank  for  their  imprison- 
ment, but  I  wish  I  felt  as  well  satisfied  that  the  arrest  of 
Morehead  and  Faulkner  was  for  equally  good  reasons.  I 
tried  to  see  them  at  Fort  Warren,  but  could  not  get  permis- 
sion.^ William  Appleton  has  had  a  letter  from  Faulkner 
which  makes  us  feel  that  his  case  is  a  hard  one,  and  I  have 
since  heard  that  both  his  daugfhter  and  Mrs.  Morehead  are 
seriously  ill.  Meantime  a  most  miserable  clamor  has  been 
raised  because  I  and  others  sent  down  some  wine  to  old 
friends,  and  interested  ourselves  in  providing  the  common 
prisoners  with  overcoats.  One  malignant  sheet  calls  us  sym- 
pathizers with  rebellion,  and  threatens  to  send  our  names  to 
the  Secretary  of  State  !  Pray  let  Seward  understand  what  a 
malicious  spirit  of  defamation  and  misrepresentation  prevails 

^  Charles  S.  Morehead,  ex-Governor  of  Kentucky,  who  had  served  with 
the  writer  in  Congi-ess,  and  Charles  J.  Faulkner  of  Virginia,  ex-Minister 
to  France. 


J 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  223 

in  this  quarter.  Language  is  often  used  which  suggests 
rather  the  ferocity  of  a  tribe  of  Apache  Indians  than  the 
sentiments  of  an  educated  and  self-respecting  community. 
I  am  glad  you  like  my  memoir  of  Nathan  Appleton.  It  was 
his  own  desire  that  I  should  write  it,  and  it  beguiled  many 
gloomy  hours. 

For  the  next  three  years  Mr.  Winthrop  was  a  good 
deal  of  an  invalid.  He  had  never  been  a  robust  man, 
and  his  fresh  complexion  gave  the  impression  of  better 
health  than  he  often  enjoyed.  Latterly,  the  strain  upon 
him  of  his  wife's  long  illness  and  death,  the  compara- 
tive loneliness  w^hich  had  succeeded  it,  his  distress  at 
the  condition  of  the  country,  too  sedentary  a  mode  of 
life,  and  too  much  brain-work,  had  all  combined  to 
subject  him  to  attacks  of  insomnia,  which  gradually 
became  persistent,  and  which  were  sometimes  attended 
by  no  inconsiderable  amount  of  physical  debility  and 
mental  depression.  Medical  advice,  with  frequent 
change  of  air  and  scene,  worked  only  a  partial  relief ; 
but  his  condition  was  never  such  as  to  confine  him  to 
the  house,  and  by  an  effort  of  will  he  continued  to  take 
an  active  part  in  the  management  of  the  numerous  in- 
stitutions with  which  he  was  connected,  occasionally 
speaking  in  public,  and  even  undertaking  some  new 
duties,  among  them  service  as  Chairman  of  the  Relief 
Committee  of  the  Massachusetts  Soldiers'  Fund.  At  a 
public  meeting  in  the  Merchants'  Exchange,  in  Feb- 
ruary, 1862,  he  paid  a  tribute  to  William  Appleton, 
and  one  to  President  Felton  in  the  following  month,  at 
a  meeting  of  this  Society.  At  the  anniversary  of  the 
American  Tract  Society,  May  27,  1862,  he  made  a 
speech  entitled  "  Tracts  for  the  Soldiers,"  which  attained 


224  A  MEMOIR  OF 

the  distinction,  or  tlie  infamy  (according  to  one's  point 
of  view),  of  being  stigmatized  by  an  Antislavery  Con- 
vention as  ^^quasi-treasonable/'  I  have  room  but  for 
a  single  paragraph :  — 

If  there  be  'a  devil  in  secession,'  as  a  fearless  Tennessee 
patriot  has  recently  told  us,  we  all  know  what  is  the  only 
power  which  has  ever  succeeded  in  casting  out  devils.  It 
was  not  the  power  of  Beelzebub;  nor  was  it  the  power  of  man. 
No  military  stratagems,  no  civil  statesmanship,  no  policy  of 
man's  device,  no  wholesale  confiscations  or  emancipations,  can 
reach  it.  It  came  of  old,  and  it  must  come  again,  from  higher 
than  human  sources  or  influences.  We  must  look,  in  God's 
good  time,  for  a  spirit  of  reconciliation,  breathed  forth  from 
the  very  throne  of  the  Most  High,  to  turn  back  our  hearts 
to  each  other  and  to  Himself;  and  we  must  invite  it,  and 
invoke  it,  and  prepare  the  way  for  it,  by  all  the  instrumen- 
talities in  our  power. 

His  remarks  on  the  following  day,  at  the  anniversary 
of  the  Massachusetts  Colonization  Society,  were  equally 
distasteful  in  some  quarters  :  — 

I  am  [said  he]  no  advocate  of  any  wholesale  projects  of 
emancipation,  —  whether  under  the  color  of  confiscation,  or 
upon  any  pretence  of  the  imaginary  necessities  of  martial 
law.  .  .  .  President  Lincoln,  whose  wisdom,  moderation,  and 
patriotism  we  all  concur  in  acknowledging  and  admiring,  — 
whether  as  exhibited  in  the  measures  he  has  taken  to  over- 
come the  assaults  of  his  enemies,  or  to  overrule  the  mad  and 
monstrous  projects  of  some  of  his  friends,  —  has  urgently  and 
repeatedly  insisted,  as  we  all  remember,  that  a  well-devised 
scheme  of  colonization  is  one  of  the  great  necessities  of  the 
present  hour.  I  believe  that,  in  so  doing,  he  has  expressed 
the  opinion  of  nine-tenths  of  the  people  of  the  United  States 
out  of  New  England. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  225 

On  the  2 2d  of  August,  1862,  he  spoke  at  short  notice 
on  Boston  Common  at  a  mass  meeting  in  aid  of  recruit- 
ing.^    Among  other  things,  he  said  :  — 

It  is  vain  to  review  the  past;  we  cannot  recall  it.  It 
is  vain  to  speculate  on  the  future;  we  cannot  penetrate  its 
hidden  depths.  It  is  vain,  and  worse  than  vain,  to  criticise 
and  cavil  about  the  present.  We  must  have  confidence  in 
somebody.  We  must  not  only  trust  in  God,  but  we  must 
trust  in  the  government  which  is  over  us,  and  in  the  generals 
whom  that  government  has  commissioned.  .  .  .  The  stern 
and  solemn  fact  is  before  us  that  three-quarters  of  a  million 
of  loyal  men  have  been  found  inadequate  to  overcome  the 
wanton  and  wicked  rebellion  which  has  lifted  its  parricidal 
hands  against  the  nation.  The  stern  and  solemn  fact  is 
before  us  that  although  so  many  glorious  successes  have 
been  accomplished,  and  so  many  deeds  of  heroic  daring  per- 
formed, our  gallant  army  has  recently  encountered  a  series  of 
checks  and  reverses  which  have  once  more  put  almost  every- 
thing in  peril.  The  stern  and  startling  fact  is  before  us  and 
upon  us,  that  the  President  has  been  constrained  to  call  for 
twice  300,000  more  men  to  rescue  us  from  defeat,  and  to  give 
us  a  hope  of  finishing  successfully  the  herculean  labor  of 
restoring  the  national  authority.  Who  can  hesitate  for  a 
moment  what  answer  shall  be  given  to  this  call  ? 

.  .  .  But  let  us  remember  that  we  are  not  engaged  in  a 
war  of  the  North  against  the  South,  but  a  war  of  the  nation 
against  those  who  have  risen  up  to  destroy  it.  Let  us  keep 
our  eyes  and  our  hearts  steadily  fixed  upon  the  old  flag  of  our 
fathers,  —  the  same  to-day  as  when  it  was  first  lifted  in  tri- 
umph at  Saratoga,  or  first  struck  down  in  madness  at  Sumter. 
That  flag  tells  our  whole  story.  We  must  do  whatever  we 
do,  and  whatever  is  necessary  to  be  done,  with  the  paramount 

1  There  were  several  platforms  on  the  Common  on  this  occasion,  — 
Governor  Andrew  speaking  at  No.  1,  Mr.  Everett  at  No.  2,  Mr.  Winthrop 
at  No.  3. 

15 


226  A  MEMOIR  OF 

purpose  of  preserving  it,  untorn  and  untarnished,  in  all  its 
radiance  and  in  all  its  just  significance.  We  must  be  true 
to  every  tint  of  its  red,  white,  and  blue.  Behold  it  at  this 
moment  streaming  from  every  window  and  watch-tower  and 
cupola  of  our  fair  city !  It  has  a  star  for  every  State.  Let 
us  resolve  that  there  shall  still  be  a  State  for  every  star ! 

On  the  9  th  of  September  he  made  another  recruiting 
speech,  this  time  in  Faneuil  Hall,  having  previously 
made  one  at  Lenox,  in  Berkshire,  where  he  had  hap- 
pened to  be  staying;  and  on  the  5th  of  November  he 
made,  by  request,  on  Boston  Common,  a  speech  on  the 
presentation  of  a  flag  to  the  Forty-Third  Massachusetts, 
or  "  Tiger  "  regiment.  In  the  preceding  month  (Octo- 
ber, 1862)  he  had  served  in  New  York  as  a  delegate  to 
the  Triennial  Convention  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church,  where  he  had  taken  a  very  active  part  in  de- 
bate, and  where  it  was  largely  due  to  his  influence  and 
exertions  that  the  Resolutions  on  the  Condition  of  the 
Church  as  affected  by  the  State  of  the  Country  were  so 
worded  as  to  pave  the  way  for  a  complete  reunion  at 
the  close  of  the  Civil  War.  In  1863  he  was  much  less 
well ;  but  among  his  public  utterances  during  that  year 
were  a  speech  in  celebration  of  the  birthday  of  Wash- 
ington, a  tribute  to  Crittenden,  one  of  the  political  and 
personal  friends  he  most  admired  and  respected,  and  an 
address  entitled  "  Concordia,"  at  the  Triennial  Festival 
of  the  Massachusetts  Charitable  Mechanic  Association.^ 

1  In  January,  1861,  President  Quincy,  Mr.  Savage,  Mr.  Sparks,  and 
Mr.  Winthrop,  meeting  at  the  Harvard  Observatory  as  members  of  the 
Visiting  Committee,  were  informed  that  Mars  was  very  near  the  earth, 
and  that,  owing  to  an  error  in  the  Ephemeris,  Concordia  could  not  be 
found;  whereupon  Mr.  Winthrop  suggested  that  the  ancients  would  have 
been  ready  to  ascribe  our  national  troubles  to  these  planetary  influences; 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  227 

In  the  same  year  he  retired  from  the  Presidency  of  the 
Alumni  of  Harvard,  after  eight  years'  service,  in  which 
connection  it  is  not  inappropriate  to  quote  a  character- 
istic compliment  paid  him  by  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes, 
who  presided  at  the  Alumni  Festival  of  1860  owing  to 
Mr.  Winthrop's  absence  in  Europe. 

"  Your  President  [said  Dr.  Holmes]  so  graces  every  assembly 
which  he  visits,  by  his  presence,  his  dignity,  his  suavity,  his 
art  of  ruling,  —  whether  it  be  the  council  of  a  nation,  the 
legislature  of  a  State,  or  the  lively  democracy  of  a  dinner- 
table,  —  that,  when  he  enters  a  meeting  like  this,  it  seems  as 
if  the  chairs  stood  back  of  their  own  will  to  let  him  pass  to 
the  head  of  the  board,  and  the  table  itself,  that  most  intelli- 
gent of  quadrupeds,  the  half-reasoning  mahogany,  tipped  him 
a  spontaneous  welcome  to  its  highest  seat,  and  of  itself  rapped 
the  assembly  to  order." 

I  conclude  this  chapter  with  a  few  extracts  from  his 
private  letters  and  diaries  in  1862  and  1863  :  — 

[Feb.  1,  1862.]  We  have  somehow  or  other  lost  the 
good-will  of  the  world.  We  cannot  do  without  it,  and  must 
make  some  sacrifices  to  recover  it.  A  recognition  of  bellig- 
erency at  an  early  moment  is  an  offence,  —  but  it  is  one  we 
have  often  given  to  others,  and  is  not  in  itself  cause  for  war. 
In  my  judgment,  the  best  way  to  avert  recognition  is  by  kind 
words  abroad  and  strong  blows  at  home.  If  it  comes,  let  us 
treat  it  with  a  silent  shrug,  remembering  how  often  we  our- 
selves have  patronized  rebellions.  You  will  be  glad  to  know 
that  Lord  St.  Germans  wrote  me  that  he  had  shown  my 
letter  to  Lords  Palmerston  and  Russell,  and  to  the  Duke  of 
Newcastle. 

and  finding  on  two  subsequent  visits  to  the  Observatory  that  Concordia 
was  still  missing,  he  pleasantly  alluded  to  the  subject  on  this  occasion, 
and  named  the  speech  accordingly. 


228  A  MEMOIR  OF 

[Aug.  21,  1862.]  I  saw  much  of  Washington  Hunt  at 
Niagara,  and  we  ran  down  to  Buffalo  and  dined  sociably  with 
Fillmore.  At  Saratoga  I  met  Governor  Morgan,  Mr.  Justice 
Wayne,  Granger,  and  others;  while  at  West  Point  I  had 
some  long  talks  with  Scott  and  Crittenden.  The  former  said, 
ten  days  ago,  that  with  the  additional  men  called  for  by  the 
President  we  ought  to  take  Richmond  and  finish  the  war 
triumphantly.  God  grant  this ;  but  it  does  not  look  like  it 
for  the  moment. 

[Nov.  8,  1862.]  I  have  no  tears  to  shed  over  the  result  in 
New  York,  though  I  do  not  sing  '  0  mio  Fernando'  The 
ultras  have  received  a  seasonable  check.  They  were  driving 
the  engine  over  the  precipice,  and  the  people  have  put  on  the 
brakes.  Seward  will  hardly  wear  mourning  for  this  overturn, 
and  Lincoln,  if  he  is  wise,  will  turn  it  to  good  account.  My 
platform  is,  —  Constitutionalism  in  Council,  Vigor  in  action. 
I  do  not  believe  that  blacks  or  whites  are  to  be  benefited  by 
sudden  and  sweeping  Acts  of  Emancipation. 

[Washington,  April  25,  1863.]  Saw  the  President  at  the 
White  House.  He  mentioned,  among  other  things,  that  his 
anxieties  of  mind  had  not  affected  his  health,  and  that  he 
weighed  180  pounds.  Sat  some  little  time  with  Seward  at 
the  State  Department.     Found  him,  as  usual,  full  of  hope. 

[Saratoga  Springs,  July  24,  1863.]  I  had  some  private 
talk  on  the  hotel  verandah  with  three  public  men  who  might 
not  wish  to  be  quoted.  One  said  that  the  country  is  coming 
out  stronger  and  richer  than  ever,  —  that  half  our  debt  (great 
as  it  is)  is  absorbed  in  currency,  and  that  everything  is  pros- 
perous in  spite  of  the  war.  Another  said  that  everything  is 
going  wrong,  and  that  nothing  but  a  change  of  administration 
will  bring  matters  right.  The  third  had  come  to  the  com- 
fortable conclusion  that  the  contest  will  be  brought  to  an  end 
at  no  distant  day,  leaving  things  but  little  changed  from  their 
old  status^  aside  from  the  loss  of  lives  and  treasure.  I  met 
with  three  equally  different  pictures  of  the  war  in  my  journey 
hither.     In  the  train  near  Rutland  were  eight  or  ten  private 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  229 

soldiers  returning  after  the  expiration  of  their  term  of  service, 
evidently  glad  to  get  back,  and  full  of  stories  of  their  experi- 
ences and  of  the  death  of  comrades.  They  were  succeeded 
near  Castleton  by  as  many  more,  freshly  drafted,  and  on  their 
way  to  the  rendezvous^  —  intelligent,  athletic  young  fellows, 
whose  merriment  seemed  forced,  and  over  whose  countenances 
sad  looks  kept  stealing.  At  another  station  was  a  group  of 
women,  young  and  old,  all  in  tears  at  parting  with  another 
batch  of  recruits.     Such  scenes  affect  me  deeply. 

[Sharon  Springs,  July  31,  1863.]  Judge  Edwards  Pierre- 
pont  called  and  described  a  recent  interview  he  had  with 
Seward,  who  (he  said)  is  now  greatly  alarmed  at  our  condi- 
tion and  fears  trouble  with  foreign  nations.  This  is  a  not  un- 
wholesome state  of  mind  for  Seward  to  be  in,  but  I  suspect  it 
may  be  partly  feigned  to  influence  others.  Pierrepont  also 
described  in  detail  a  visit  paid  by  him  to  the  President  on 
the  Sunday  before  the  issuing  of  the  Emancipation  Proclama- 
tion. He  found  Lincoln  lying  on  a  sofa,  in  a  sort  of  yellow 
linen  dressing-gown  and  embroidered  slippers.  After  some 
conversation,  he  suddenly  inquired  of  Judge  P.  what  he 
thought  of  the  Emancipation  scheme,  and  then  jumped  up, 
gesticulating  vehemently,  and  exclaimed,  '  It  is  my  last  card, 
and  I  will  play  it  and  may  win  the  trick.'  Pierrepont  said 
James  Wads  worth  was  present  on  this  occasion. 

[Newport,  Aug.  31, 1863.]  By  the  doctor's  orders  I  mingle 
in  the  gay  throng,  dine  out  three  or  four  times  a  week,  and 
look  in  at  matinees  and  soirees  ;  but  while  I  am  none  the  worse 
for  it,  I  greatly  doubt  if  T  am  any  better,  and  my  nights  con- 
tinue wretched.  What  I  have  most  enjoyed  lately  has  been 
reading  the  last  volume  of  Washington  Irving's  Life.  I 
found  some  letters  in  it  from  him  to  me,  and  one  of  them, 
which  I  had  nearly  forgotten,  is  quite  a  gem.  Pierre  Irving, 
however,  is  a  little  mistaken  in  his  dates.  I  knew  his  uncle 
as  early  as  1840.  Mercier,  the  French  Minister,  tells  me  he 
is  opposed  to  any  prolonged  occupation  of  Mexico. 


230  A  MEMOIR  OF 


X. 


In  1861,  by  a  family  arrangement,  Mr.  Winthrop 
came  into  possession  of  a  mass  of  letters  and  State 
papers,  chiefly  of  the  colonial  period,  which,  together 
with  those  previously  inherited  by  him  from  his  father, 
constituted  the  largest  collection  of  its  kind  in  New 
England,  and  proved  unexpectedly  rich  in  new  material 
of  much  historical  value.  Everything  which  did  not  im- 
mediately relate  to  Governor  John  Winthrop  the  elder, 
he  placed  at  the  disposal  of  this  Society,  in  order  that 
selections  might  be  gradually  printed  for  the  use  of 
students,  and  he  actively  co-operated  in  editing  the 
first  three  volumes  of  such  selections,  besides  separately 
communicating  to  our  Proceedings  many  manuscripts 
of  special  interest.^  It  had  long  been  his  desire  to 
write  a  Life  of  John  Winthrop,  toward  which  he  had 
already  made  considerable  preparation,  and  the  dis- 
covery of  this  new  matter  enabled  him  to  issue  the  first 
volume  at  the  close  of  1863.  The  task  was  a  congenial 
one,  but  it  entailed  prodigious  labor,  as  of  all  the 
puzzling  handwritings  of  early  colonial  times  that  of 
Governor  Winthrop  is  perhaps  hardest  to  decipher,  while 
the  difficulty  of  supplying  missing  names  and  dates  was 
very  great.  Resisting  the  temptation  to  furnish  what 
is  technically  known  as  a  "  popular  "  Life  of  his  subject, 

1  Up  to  the  present  time  the  Society  has  printed  six  separate  volumes 
of  selections  from  Mr.  Winthrop's  "Winthrop  Papers,"  and  one  volume 
of  selections  from  his  "  Bowdoin  and  Temple  Papers."  The  equivalent  of 
at  least  one  other  volume  is  to  be  found  scattered  through  our  Collections 
and  Proceedings ;  but  much  still  remains  to  be  done,  as  the  mine  is  far 
from  being  exhausted. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  231 

—  an  undertaking  he  preferred  to  leave  to  others,  —  his 
object  was  not  merely  to  supply  an  exhaustive  work  of 
reference,  but  so  to  arrange  the  letters  and  journals,  the 
confessions  and  experiences,  of  one  who  has  been  so  often 
styled  the  founder  and  father  of  New  England,  that  the 
story  of  his  career  should  be  substantially  told  in  his 
own  words. 

I  do  not  forget  [wrote  Mr.  Winthrop  in  his  introduction] 
the  caution  suggested  in  the  old  couplet  of  the  author  of  the 
'  Night  Thoughts,'  — 

*  They  that  on  glorious  ancestors  enlarge 
Produce  their  debt,  instead  of  their  discharge.* 

I  hardly  know,  however,  of  a  deeper  debt  which  any  one 
can  incur,  or  of  a  more  binding  obhgation  which  any  one  can 
discharge,  —  whenever  circumstances  may  afford  the  means 
and  opportunity  of  doing  so,  —  than  to  bring  out  from  the 
treasures  of  the  past,  and  to  hold  up  to  the  view  of  the  present 
and  coming  generations,  a  great  example  of  private  virtue  and 
pubhc  usefulness ;  of  moderation  in  counsel  and  energy  in 
action ;  of  stern  self-denial  and  unsparing  self-devotion ;  of 
childlike  trust  in  God,  and  implicit  faith  in  the  gospel  of 
Christ,  united  with  courage  enough  for  conducting  a  colony 
across  the  ocean,  and  wisdom  enough  for  building  up  a  State 
in  the  wilderness.  Nor  could  any  one  easily  subject  himself 
to  a  juster  reproach  than  that  of  shrinking  from  the  discharge 
of  such  a  debt,  for  fear  of  being  thought  inclined  to  exaggerate 
the  importance,  or  to  magnify  the  merits  of  a  remote  ancestry .^ 

1  In  days  when  the  flame  of  party  animosity  blazed  high  in  Massachu- 
setts, and  before  the  two  men  had  become  good  friends,  our  lamented  asso- 
ciate, Judge  Rockwood  Hoar,  has  been  known  more  than  once  to  intimate 
that  Mr.  Winthrop  was  not  unaddicted  to  an  occasional  habit  of  blowing 
a  trumpet  in  honor  of  his  great  ancestor,  at  meetings  of  this  Society  or 
elsewhere.  I  am  not  prepared  to  affirm  that  there  was  never  any  founda- 
tion for  such  a  charge,  but  the  thing  was  done,  if  done  at  all,  uncon- 
sciously and  in  good  faith.     The  truth  is  that  the  Governor  was  precisely 


232  A  MEMOIR  OF 

More  than  two  centuries  have  now  passed  away  since  the 
elder  Winthrop  was  laid  in  his  narrow  tomb.  Six  genera- 
tions of  descendants  have  intervened  between  him  and  myself. 
At  such  a  distance  of  time,  I  trust  my  sincerity  will  not  be 
questioned  when  I  say,  with  another  and  older  poet,  — 

<  Et  genus  et  proavos,  et  quae  non  f ecimus  ipsi, 
Vix  ea  nostra  voco.' 

The  uncertain  state  of  his  health  decided  him  to  pub- 
lish the  first  volume  by  itself^  without  waiting  to  finish 
the  second,  which  appeared  two  years  later.  The  recep- 
tion of  both  by  the  press,  and  by  that  portion  of  the 
reading  public  interested  in  early  New  England  history, 
was  eminently  gratifying,  and  not  the  less  so  because 
some  of  the  longest  and  most  appreciative  notices  of  the 
book  were  written  by  total  strangers  to  him,  one,  in  par- 
ticular, in  "  Blackwood's  Magazine"  for  August,  1867.^ 

[April  30,  1864.]  I  sent  you  my  Sliaksperiana^  hastily  got 
up  for  the  Annual  Meeting  of  our  Historical  Society.  It  has 
a  fact  or  two  of  which,  though  I  ventured  to  tell  my  confreres 
'we  do  not  forget,'  I  have  no  idea  that  any  of  them  knew 
;  before  I  told  them.  The  disasters  of  the  spring  campaign 
thus  far  are  depressing.  Congress,  too,  exhibits  lamentable 
indecency  and  rowdyism.  Lincoln's  letter  to  the  Kentucky 
men  is  among  his  best  efforts.     Why  is  he  not  willing  to  let 

the  sort  of  public  character  Mr.  Winthrop  would  have  warmly  admired, 
even  if  he  had  been  in  no  way  related  to  him  ;  for  he  was  not  only  all 
that  he  is  described  to  have  been,  in  the  above  paragraph,  but  he  had, 
like  his  descendant,  a  marked  distaste  for  rampant  and  windy  enthusiasts 
of  both  sexes,  coupled  with  a  firm  persuasion  that,  in  a  community,  "  the 
best  part  is  always  the  least,  and  of  that  best  part  the  wiser  is  always  the 
lesser." 

1  Among  other  reviews  of  it,  those  which  appeared  in  the  "  North 
American  Review"  for  January,  1864,  and  January,  1867;  the  "Atlantic 
Monthly  "  for  January,  1864 ;  the  "  Christian  Examiner  "  for  March,  1864; 
and  the  "  Princeton  Review  "  for  April,  1864,  are  worthy  of  mention. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  233 

Grant  employ  McClellan?  It  would  do  much  to  reinstate 
public  confidence.  By  the  way,  I  met  McDowell  at  dinner 
here  some  little  time  ago,  and  was  agreeably  surprised  to  find 
him  one  of  the  most  modest,  intelligent,  and  agreeable  officers 
whose  acquaintance  I  had  made  during  the  war.  I  was  a 
guest  last  week  at  a  banquet  of  the  Saturday  Club,  where  I 
sat  between  Longfellow  and  Holmes.  Agassiz  presided, 
and  called  me  out  after  Emerson  and  Richard  Grant  White. 
I  spoke  some  ten  minutes.  So  did  Governor  Andrew,  Free- 
man Clarke,  and  others,  while  Holmes  read  a  spirited  poem. 
But  the  occasion  was  more  in  your  line  than  mine ;  the  older 
I  grow  the  less  I  care  for  such  things,  though  they  are  some- 
times unavoidable. 

In  the  course  of  a  short  address,  entitled  More 
Tracts  for  the  Camp,  delivered  at  the  anniversary  of 
the  American  Tract  Society  in  Boston,  May  24,  1864, 
he  took  occasion  to  say :  — 

Never,  certainly,  was  there  greater  need  than  now  of  earnest 
and  united  efforts,  among  Christians  of  all  sections  and  of  all 
sects,  to  stay  the  flood  of  vice  and  crime,  of  immorality  and 
irreligion,  which  is  sweeping  so  wildly  over  our  land.  I  would 
not  exaggerate  the  pernicious  effects  of  this  deplorable  civil 
war  upon  public  and  private  morality.  Doubtless  there  have 
been  developments  of  courage  and  patriotism,  of  benevolence 
and  munificence,  of  self-denial  and  self-sacrifice,  among  the 
men  and  among  the  women  of  our  land,  during  the  last  two 
or  three  years,  which  are  worthy  of  all  admiration,  and  which 
furnish  no  small  set-off  to  the  balance  of  evil  on  the  other 
side  of  the  account.  But  no  one  can  be  unconscious  of  the 
fearful  influences  of  times  like  the  present,  in  enfeebling  and 
almost  extinguishing  that  sense  of  individual  responsibility, 
moral  and  religious,  which  is  the  great  safeguard  of  social 
virtue.  No  one  can  be  blind  to  the  reckless  extravagance, 
the  dishonest  contracts,  the  gambling  speculations,  the  cor- 


234  A  MEMOIR  OF 

rupting  luxury,  the  intemperance,  profligacy,  and  crime,  which 
have  followed  with  still  accelerating  steps  in  the  train  of  the 
terrible  struggle  with  which  we  are  engaged.  No  one  can 
fail  to  perceive  the  danger  that  a  real  or  even  a  professed 
patriotism  may  be  made  the  cover  for  a  multitude  of  sins,  and 
gallantry  on  the  field  of  battle  be  regarded  as  a  substitute  for 
all  the  duties  of  the  decalogue.  .  .  .  The  camps  of  our  armies 
are  among  the  choicest  fields  for  labors  like  those  in  which  this 
Society  is  engaged.  There  is  a  yearning  and  a  craving,  we 
are  told  by  our  agents,  for  the  word  of  life,  among  those  to 
whom  the  prospect  of  death  is  so  immediately  present  as  it  is 
to  soldiers  on  the  perilous  edge  of  battle.  There  is  a  hunger 
and  thirst  after  tidings  of  a  better  world  among  those  who 
feel  how  soon  they  may  be  summoned  away  from  this  world. 
And  woe  to  us  all,  if  we  fail  to  meet  the  full  demand  for 
these  moral  and  religious  supplies  !  Woe  to  our  country, 
if  it  fails  to  cherish  and  sustain  this  and  other  kindred  socie- 
ties which  make  up  together  the  great  Christian  Commissariat 
of  the  War ! 

[Sept.  1, 1864.]  I  am  pleased  to  know  you  liked  my  tribute 
to  President  Quincy,  with  which  I  took  some  pains.  Since 
then  I  have  passed  a  pleasant  week  at  Newport  with  Holmes 
for  fellow-boarder.  Your  wife  would  not  let  you  live  in  the 
house  a  day  with  him  if  she  were  to  hear  him  talk  about  reli- 
gion ;  but  my  creed  is  proof  against  his  rationalistic  theories. 
Meantime  his  patriotism  and  loyalty  are  up  to  fever  heat, 
while  I  content  myself  with  keeping  true  to  the  good  old 
Constitutional  range  between  '76  and  '89.  I  greatly  fear  that 
you  and  I  are  going  to  differ  about  the  Presidential  question, 
and  that  it  is  too  late  for  you  to  talk  me  over.  It  really  seems 
to  me  as  if  the  best  hope  of  restoring  the  Union  was  in  a 
change  of  administration,  and  I  feel  irresistibly  compelled  to 
support  McClellan,  though  the  advertisement  of  my  name 
as  intending  to  speak  at  the  meeting  in  New  York  last  month 
was  without  my  knowledge  or  consent.  I  shall  not  improbably 
have  something  to  say  later,  if  my  health  admits. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  235 

[Sept.  10.]  The  news  from  Atlanta  ought  to  have  made  us 
all  young  again.  Sherman  is  a  grand  fellow.  All  his  strategy- 
is  of  the  highest  order,  and  his  letter  about  our  Massachusetts 
recruiting  system  a  choice  utterance.  We  shall  have  him 
in  the  White  House  one  of  these  days,  but  it  is  too  late  now. 
I  admit  that  the  Chicago  platform  does  not  suit  my  fancy, 
and  that  George  Pendleton  is  hardly  my  heau  ideal  for  Vice- 
President  ;  but,  on  the  whole,  I  do  not  see  my  way  clear  to 
prefer  Lincoln  and  Johnson  to  McClellan  and  Pendleton. 
The  former's  letter  of  acceptance  is  admirable,  and  I  can 
say  Amen  to  it. 

Mr.  Winthrop's  acquaintance  with  General  McClellan 
had  been  only  of  a  few  years'  duration ;  but  during  that 
time  he  had  formed  a  very  high  opinion  of  him,  the 
result  both  of  personal  intercourse  and  correspondence 
upon  public  affairs,  considering  him  a  brave,  prudent, 
thoroughly  patriotic  man,  a  stranger  to  political  manage- 
ment and  political  intrigue,  but  possessing  a  degree  of 
personal  magnetism  invaluable  alike  to  a  great  com- 
mander and  to  a  Presidential  candidate.  He  recognized, 
however,  that  President  Lincoln  was  the  abler  and 
shrewder  man  of  the  two,  and  one  whose  natural  lean- 
ings were  quite  as  conservative ;  but  it  seemed  to  him 
that  the  latter  had  been  led  by  political  exigencies  and 
party  trammels  into  an  objectionable  policy,  which  had 
perverted  the  original  object  of  the  war  and  threatened 
to  prolong  its  duration.  He  had  opposed  the  latter' s 
original  candidacy  because  he  feared  that  his  election 
would  be  the  signal  for  one  of  the  bloodiest  struggles  of 
modern  times,  and  in  this  the  event  proved  him  right. 
He  now  opposed  the  latter's  second  candidacy  because 
he  believed  that  another  President  and  a  different  policy 
would  bring  that  struggle  to  an  earlier  termination,  and 


236  A  MEMOIR   OF 

in  this  the  event  proved  him  wrong.  Like  many  other 
loyal  public  men  of  the  North,  some  of  them  personal 
friends  with  whom  he  had  consulted,  he  was  under 
the  impression  that  the  Southern  Confederacy  had  it 
in  their  power  to  protract  hostilities  for  several  years. 
Could  he  have  foreseen  that  this  Confederacy  would 
collapse  within  nine  months,  or  had  the  Chicago  Con- 
vention seen  fit  to  nominate  an  out-and-out  Democrat, 
he  might  have  felt  differently.  As  matters  stood,  and 
after  the  most  careful  consideration  he  could  reach, 
his  course  seemed  clear,  and  he  had  no  hesitation  in 
declaring  himself.  On  the  17th  of  September,  1864, 
he  was  one  of  the  prominent  speakers  at  the  great 
open-air  meeting  in  New  York  to  ratify  McClellan's 
nomination, —  the  largest  political  gathering  he  had 
ever  attended,  and  stated  to  have  been  the  largest  ever 
assembled,  up  to  that  time,  in  this  country.  The  state 
of  his  health  obliged  him  to  decline  many  similar  invi- 
tations, but  a  month  later  (Oct.  18,  1864)  he  made  a 
long  and  elaborate  speech,  intended  for  circulation  as  a 
campaign  document,  at  a  great  open-air  meeting  at 
New  London,  choosing  this  locality  because  it  was  one 
with  which  he  had  family  associations,  and  because 
Connecticut  was  considered  one  of  the  doubtful  States. 
On  the  2d  of  November,  too,  he  made  a  shorter  speech 
in  the  Boston  Music  Hall,  at  a  so-called  campfire  of  the 
McClellan  Legion.  These  three  speeches  together  cover 
no  less  than  fifty  pages  of  close  type,  and,  though  they 
necessarily  include  a  certain  amount  of  repetition,  they 
cannot  be  fully  described  in  a  memoir  like  this,  but  I 
quote  from  them  at  some  length  in  order  to  clearly 
define  his  position  and  exhibit  the  general  tone  of  his 
argument :  — 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  237 

The  candidate  whom  we  support  is  eminently  a  young  man's 
candidate,  —  the  youngest  in  years,  I  believe,  that  was  ever 
nominated  for  the  Presidency ;  but  who  has  won  laurels 
in  the  field,  and  shown  a  discretion  and  a  wisdom  in  civil 
affairs  which  would  have  done  honor  to  the  oldest.  It  might 
well  be  the  pride  of  the  young  men  of  America  not  only  to 
see  that  he  has  fair  play  and  a  generous  support,  but  to  secure 
him  an  opportunity  of  showing  what  young  men  can  do,  and 
are  destined  to  do,  in  the  high  places  of  the  land,  as  well  as 
on  the  field  of  battle.  The  question  before  us,  however,  is 
not  about  candidates,  but  about  our  country ;  not  about  the 
relative  claims  or  merits  of  Abraham  Lincoln  and  George  B. 
McClellan,  but  about  the  nation's  welfare  and  the  nation's 
life.  In  whose  hands  will  that  precious  life  be  safest  ?  That 
is  the  question ;  and  I  do  not  forget  that  it  is  a  question  of 
opinion,  on  which  every  man  has  a  right  to  form,  and  every 
man  has  a  right  to  follow,  his  own  opinion.  Nothing  could  be 
further  from  my  purpose  than  to  cast  the  slightest  imputation 
upon  the  patriotism  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  or  anybody  else. 
Those  who  are  of  opinion  that  he  is  just  about  to  succeed  in 
bringing  the  war  to  a  successful  termination  are  right  to  give 
him  their  support.  We  would  all  support  him  if  we  were  of 
this  opinion,  for  we  want  the  country  saved,  no  matter  who 
is  to  have  the  glory.  I  can  only  say  that  in  my  humble  judg- 
ment, the  policy  of  liis  administration,  as  gradually  developed, 
has  been  a  policy  calculated  to  divide  and  weaken  the  coun- 
sels of  the  North,  and  to  unite  and  concentrate  the  energies  of 
the  South,  —  a  policy  in  which  the  all-important  end  of  re-estab- 
lishing the  Union  is  now  almost  shut  out  of  sight,  so  mixed  up 
and  complicated  has  it  been  with  schemes  of  philanthropy  on 
the  one  side,  and  with  schemes  of  confiscation,  subjugation,  and 
extermination  on  the  other.  Instead  of  the  one  great  constitu- 
tional idea  of  restoration^  we  have  been  treated  to  all  manner 
of  projects  and  theories  of  reconstruction.  At  one  time  we 
have  had  solemn  propositions  for  annihilating  whole  States, 
whole  systems  of  States,  and  blotting  out  their  stars  from 


238  A  MEMOIR  OF 

our  national  banner.  At  another  we  have  heard  open  declara- 
tions that  we  were  never  again  to  be  permitted  to  have  '  the 
Constitution  as  it  is,  and  the  Union  as  it  was.'  Good  heavens, 
what  else  are  we  fighting  for?  What  other  Union  are  we 
striving  to  establish?  What  other  Constitution  are  our  rulers 
and  legislators  solemnly  sworn  to  support  ?  .  .  . 

We  all  know  that  it  was  the  success  of  the  Republican 
party,  with  its  sectional  organization  and  its  alleged  sectional 
objects,  which  furnished  the  original  occasion,  four  years  ago, 
for  that  ungodly  and  atrocious  assault  upon  our  Government 
which  inaugurated  this  gigantic  civil  war.  We  all  know  that 
the  secession  leaders  of  the  South,  who  had  so  long  been 
meditating  the  movement  in  vain,  exulted  in  the  election  of 
Abraham  Lincoln  at  that  day,  —  as  I  fully  believe  they  will 
exult  again,  if  he  is  rechosen  in  November,  —  because  it 
supplied  the  very  fuel  which  was  needed  for  this  awful 
conflagration.  That  assault  upon  the  Government  can  never 
be  characterized  in  terms  of  too  severe  condemnation;  and 
if  railing  at  the  rebellion  or  its  authors  would  do  any  good 
this  evening,  —  if  it  would  be  anything  better  than  baying  at 
yonder  moon,  —  I  would  join  with  you  in  denouncing  it 
until  the  vocabulary  of  condemnation  was  exhausted.  But 
we  all  know  that  the  whole  North  rose  nobly  up,  as  one 
man,  without  distinction  of  party,  to  repel  that  assault ;  and 
that  they  have  sustained  the  Government  —  Democrats, 
Republicans,  and  Conservatives  alike  —  with  all  their  hearts 
and  hands,  pouring  out  their  blood  and  money  like  water 
from  that  day  to  this.  And  the  loyal  States  will  continue 
to  sustain  the  'powers  that  be'  in  all  their  constitutional 
action  until  the  end  of  their  term,  whatever  may  be  the 
result  of  the  pending  election.  But  no  considerations  of 
loyalty  or  patriotism  call  upon  us  to  unite  in  prolonging  the 
supremacy  of  a  party  whose  art  and  part  it  has  so  eminently 
been  to  extinguish  almost  every  spark  of  Union  sentiment  in 
Southern  breasts,  and  to  implant  in  them  a  spirit  of  despera- 
tion and  hatred  which  has  rendered  the  victories  of  our  armies 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  239 

harder  to  achieve,  and  has  robbed  them  of  so  many  of  their 
legitimate  results  after  they  have  been  achieved.  .  .  .  We 
need  a  change  of  counsels.  We  need  a  change  of  counsellors. 
We  need  to  go  back  to  the  principles  embodied  in  the  resolu- 
tion adopted  by  Congress,  not  far  from  the  fourth  day  of 
July,  1861,  and  worthy  to  have  been  adopted  on  that  hallowed 
anniversary  itself,  —  adopted  in  the  Senate  on  the  motion  of 
Andrew  Johnson,  and  in  the  House  on  the  motion  of  the 
lamented  Crittenden.  That  resolution  embodied  the  simple 
policy  of  a  vigorous  prosecution  of  the  war  for  no  purpose  of 
subjugation  or  aggression,  in  no  spirit  of  revenge  or  hatred, 
with  no  disposition  to  destroy  or  impair  the  constitutional 
rights  of  any  State  or  section,  but  for  the  sole  end  of  vindi- 
cating the  Constitution  and  re-establishing  the  Union.  Such  a 
policy  has  been  enforced  and  illustrated  by  General  McClellan 
in  his  memorable  despatch  from  Harrison's  Landing,  in  his 
brilliant  oration  at  West  Point,  and  in  his  admirable  letter 
accepting  the  nomination,  which  alone  constitutes  a  platform 
broad  enough  and  comprehensive  enough  for  every  patriot  in 
the  land  to  stand  upon.  It  has  the  clarion  ring  to  rally  a 
nation  to  the  rescue.  It  speaks,  too,  in  trumpet  tones  to  our 
deluded  brethren  in  rebellion,  warning  them  that  there  is  to 
be  no  cessation  of  hostilities  upon  any  other  basis  than  that  of 
Union,  but  proclaiming  to  them  that  the  door  of  reconciliation 
and  peace  is  open  on  their  resuming  their  allegiance  to  the  Con- 
stitution and  the  laws.  That  letter  of  acceptance  has  turned 
the  flank  of  his  revilers,  and  has  taken  away  every  pretext 
for  those  indecent  and  unjust  insinuations  against  opponents 
of  the  Administration,  which  have  fallen  from  so  many 
ruthless  partisan  pens,  and  from  so  many  reckless  partisan 
tongues.  The  air  is  full  of  them.  Arbitrary  and  arrogant 
assumptions  of  superior  patriotism  and  loyalty;  coarse  and 
malicious  misrepresentations  and  imputations ;  opprobrious 
and  insulting  names  and  epithets,  —  they  come  swarming  up 
from  stump  and  rostrum  and  press  and  platform.  We  meet 
them  at  every  turn.    Let  us  not  retort  them  or  resent  them. 


240  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Let  us  imitate  the  example  of  our  candidate,  whose  quiet 
endurance  of  injustice  and  calumny  has  been  one  of  the 
most  beautiful  illustrations  of  his  character.  Let  us  pass 
on,  unawed  and  unintimidated,  to  the  declaration  of  our 
own  honest  opinions,  and  to  the  assertion  and  exercise  of 
our  rights  as  freemen.  With  such  an  issue  as  national  life 
or  national  death  before  us,  there  ought  to  be  no  hesitation. 
Every  one  of  us,  young  and  old,  is  called  upon  by  considera- 
tions from  which  there  can  be  no  appeal,  by  obligations  from 
which  there  can  be  no  escape,  to  form  a  careful,  dispassionate, 
conscientious  opinion  as  to  his  own  individual  duty,  and  then 
to  perform  that  duty  without  flinching  or  faltering.  We  may 
be  pardoned  for  an  honest  mistake.  We  may  be  excused  for  an 
error  of  judgment.  But  we  can  never  be  excused,  before  men 
or  before  God,  for  standing  neutral  and  doing  nothing.  .  .  . 

I  was  greatly  struck  by  an  account  of  an  interview  which 
certain  very  earnest  antislavery  gentlemen  held  with  the 
President,  not  a  great  while  ago,  on  the  subject  of  substi- 
tuting General  Fremont  for  my  old  friend  Edward  Stanly  as 
Provisional  Governor  of  North  Carolina.  President  Lincoln 
is  represented  to  have  replied,  '  Gentlemen,  it  is  generally  the 
case  that  a  man  who  begins  a  work  is  hot  the  best  man  to  carry 
it  on  to  a  successful  termination.  I  believe  it  w^as  so  in  the 
case  of  Moses,  was  it  not  ?  He  got  the  children  of  Israel  out  of 
Egypt,  but  the  Lord  selected  some  one  else  to  bring  them  to 
their  journey's  end.  A  pioneer  has  hard  work  to  do,  and 
generally  gets  so  battered  and  spattered  that  people  prefer 
another,  even  though  they  may  accept  the  principle.'  It  would 
seem  that  nothing  was  said  at  this  interview  about  the  '  danger 
of  swapping  horses  in  crossing  a  stream.'  On  the  contrary, 
the  President  emphatically  appealed  to  that  memorable  prece- 
dent in  Holy  Writ  when  the  children  of  Israel,  being  them- 
selves about  to  cross  a  stream,  were  compelled  to  follow  a  new 
leader  in  order  to  get  safely  over.  We  all  know  that  they 
could  never  have  crossed  the  Jordan  and  entered  into  the 
promised  land,  had  they  refused  to  accept  Joshua  as  their 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  241 

leader,  and  some  of  us  are  not  a  little  afraid  that  the  same 
fatality  which  attended  the  ancient  Moses  is  about  to  find  a 
fresh  illustration  in  the  case  of  our  modern  Abraham.  I  am  not 
here,  as  I  have  said  before,  to  indulge  in  any  personal  imputa- 
tion upon  President  Lincoln ;  and  let  me  say,  in  passing,  that 
he  has  received  harder  blows  from  some  of  his  own  followers  — 
from  Senator  Wade,  Winter  Davis,  General  Fremont,  and 
others  who  have  been  less  open  but  not  less  violent  in  their 
denunciations  of  him  — than  he  has  from  any  of  his  opponents.^ 
But  I  cannot  help  remarking  tliat,  in  my  humble  opinion,  he 
would  have  adopted  a  course  worthy  of  all  commendation  if, 
instead  of  talking  about  swapping  horses  in  crossing  a  stream, 
he  could  have  been  induced  to  say,  six  months  ago,  to  the  peo- 
ple of  the  United  States  something  of  this  sort :  '  You  elected 
me  fairly  your  President,  and  the  President  of  the  whole  Union, 
four  years  ago.  I  have  done  my  best  to  vindicate  my  title  to 
the  trust  you  conferred.  The  loyal  States  have  nobly  sup- 
ported me.  You  have  given  me  all  the  men  and  all  the  money 
I  have  asked  for.  You  have  borne  and  forborne  with  me  in 
many  changes  of  policy,  and  in  all  the  assertions  of  arbitrary 
power  to  which  I  have  thought  it  necessary  to  resort.  I  shall 
go  on  to  the  best  of  my  ability  to  the  end  of  my  allotted  term ; 
but  I  am  then  ready  to  return  to  the  ranks.     No  pride  of 

1  An  interesting  assemblage  of  documents  relating  to  this  Presidential 
campaign  was  furnished  by  Mr.  Charles  A.  Dana  to  the  New  York  "  Sun'* 
of  June  30,  1889.  It  appears  that  on  the  18th  of  August,  1864,  Horace 
Greeley  wrote  :  "  Mr.  Lincoln  is  already  beaten.  He  cannot  be  elected. 
If  we  had  such  a  ticket  as  Grant,  Butler,  or  Sherman  for  President,  and 
Farragut  for  Vice,  we  could  make  a  fight  yet,  and  such  a  ticket  we  ought 
to  have."  On  the  29th  of  August,  1864,  John  Jay  wrote  from  Newport, 
advising  that  Mr.  Lincoln  should  be  asked  to  retire  from  the  candidacy 
and  suggesting  that  "such  a  letter  might  be  prepared  as  would  compel  his 
[Lincoln's]  acquiescence."  On  the  1st  of  September,  1864,  Charles  Sumner 
wrote  :  "  It  may  be  that  Mr.  Lincoln  will  see  that  we  shall  all  be  stronger 
and  more  united  under  another  candidate.  But  if  he  does  not  see  it  so, 
our  duty  is  none  the  less  clear."  On  the  following  day,  Sept.  2,  1864, 
Whitelaw  Reid  wrote  to  express  similar  views,  and  adding :  "  We  think 
McClellan  and  Pendleton  a  very  strong  ticket,  and  fear  the  result.'* 

16 


242  A  MEMOIR  OF 

place,  no  loss  of  patronage  or  power,  shall  induce  me  to  stand 
in  your  way  for  a  moment  in  your  great  struggle  to  restore 
the  Union  of  our  fathers.  I  do  not  forget  how  much  of  per- 
sonal prejudice  and  party  jealousy  was  arrayed  against  me  at 
the  outset.  I  do  not  forget  how  deeply  political  and  sectional 
antagonisms  entered  into  the  causes  of  this  rebellion.  I  am 
not  insensible  that  the  policy  I  have  recently  felt  constrained 
to  adopt  has  increased  and  aggravated  those  prejudices  and 
those  antagonisms.  Select  a  new  candidate.  Choose  a  new 
President,  against  whom,  and  against  whose  friends,  there 
will  be  less  of  preconceived  hostility  and  hate ;  and  may  God 
give  him  wisdom  and  courage  to  save  the  country  and  restore 
the  Union  ! '  What  a  glorious  example  of  patriotic  self-denial 
and  magnanimity  this  would  have  been !  Who  would  not  have 
envied  President  Lincoln  the  opportunity  of  exhibiting  it? 
I  am  b}^  no  means  sure  it  would  not  have  re-elected  him  Presi- 
dent in  spite  of  himself.  But  he  has  thought  fit  to  adopt  the 
very  reverse  of  this  magnanimous  and  self-denying  policy.  He 
has  quite  forgotten  that  one-term  principle  to  which  he  and  I 
were  committed  as  members  of  the  old  Whig  party.  We  see 
him  clinging  eagerly  to  patronage  and  place.  We  see  him 
demanding  to  be  renominated,  demanding  to  be  re-elected, 
and  claiming  it  almost  as  a  test  of  patriotism  and  loyalty  that 
we  should  all  with  one  accord  support  him  for  four  years  more. 
We  hear  his  Secretary  of  State  comparing  a  vote  against 
Abraham  Lincoln  to  giving  aid  and  comfort  to  the  rebels,  and 
even  indulging  in  what  is  well  called  a  portentous  threat,  that 
if  the  people  shall  dare  to  choose  a  new  President,  the  Govern- 
ment will  be  abdicated,  and  let  fall  to  pieces  by  itself,  between 
the  election  and  the  inauguration.  An  absurd  assumption, 
that  a  support  of  a  government  must  necessarily  involve  a 
support  of  the  policy  of  an  existing  administration,  —  this 
absurd  and  preposterous  assumption,  which  has  been  put  for- 
ward so  arrogantly  within  the  last  year  or  two,  is  now  pushed 
on  to  the  monstrous  length  of  maintaining  that  patriotism 
demands  the  re-election  of  an  existing  President  in  time  of 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  243 

war,  even  though  a  majority  of  the  people  may  have  no  confi- 
dence in  the  capacity  of  the  incumbent,  either  for  conducting 
the  war  or  for  negotiating  a  peace.  No  changing  Presidents 
in  the  hour  of  danger  or  struggle,  is  the  cry.  No  swapping 
horses  in  crossing  a  stream.  Everything  else  may  be  changed 
or  swapped.  You  may  change  commanders-in-chief  in  the  very 
face  of  the  enemy ;  you  may  remove  a  gallant  leader,  as  you 
did  General  McClellan,  when  he  had  just  achieved  one  glori- 
ous victory,  and  was  on  his  way  to  the  almost  certain  achieve- 
ment of  another ;  you  may  swap  Secretaries  of  War,  as  you 
did  Cameron  for  Stanton ;  you  may  swap  Secretaries  of  the 
Treasury,  as  you  did  Chase  for  Fessenden;  you  may  swap 
Postmasters-General,  as  you  have  just  done  Blair  for  Denni- 
son ;  you  may  change  your  candidates  for  the  Vice-Presidency 
'handy-dandy,'  and  leave  Mr.  Hannibal  Hamlin  to  shoulder 
his  musket  in  a  Bangor  militia  company.  Thus  far  you  may 
go,  but  no  further.  You  must  not  touch  me.  You  must  not 
change  Presidents.  Patriotism  requires  that  Abraham  Lincoln 
shall  be  exempt  from  all  such  casualties.  And  so  we  are  all  to 
be  drummed  into  voting  for  him  under  a  threat  of  the  pains  and 
penalties  of  treason.  This  extraordinary  doctrine  is  getting 
to  be  a  little  contagious,  and  from  some  recent  manifestations 
in  my  own  part  of  the  country  I  should  suppose  it  was  fast 
becoming  a  cherished  dogma  among  office-holders  of  all  grades, 
both  national  and  State,  that  the  only  true  patriotism  con- 
sisted in  keeping  them  all  snugly  in  place,  and  that  a  failure 
to  vote  for  any  or  all  of  them  was  little  better  than  disloyalty 
to  the  Government.  It  is  certainly  very  accommodating  in 
our  Presidents,  and  Governors,  and  Senators,  and  Representa- 
tives thus  to  save  the  people  the  trouble  of  an  election.  If  the 
war  lasts  four  years  more,  we  may  be  spared  the  trouble  of 
elections  altogether.  My  friends,  if  the  people  are  wise,  they 
will  give  some  of  their  public  servants  a  lesson  on  this  subject 
before  it  is  too  late,  and  teach  them  that  the  freedom  of  elec- 
tions is  too  precious  a  privilege  to  be  abandoned  at  the  dicta- 
tion of  those  who  have  already  enjoyed  a  greater  length  of 


244  A  MEMOIR  OF 

service,  as  some  of  us  think,  than  is  altogether  consistent  with 
the  public  welfare  and  the  public  safety.  The  progress  of 
this  terrible  war  is  leaving  its  mark  on  not  a  few  of  our  most 
cherished  privileges  as  free  men.  An  overshadowing  doctrine 
of  necessity  has  obliterated  not  a  few  of  the  old  constitutional 
limitations  and  landmarks  of  authority.  An  armed  preroga- 
tive has  gradually  lifted  itself  to  an  appalling  height  through- 
out the  land.  But,  thank  Heaven,  it  is  still  in  the  power  of 
the  people  to  assert  their  right  to  a  fair  and  free  election  of 
their  rulers.  And  if  they  shall  do  so  successfully,  —  what- 
ever may  be  the  result,  —  no  nobler  spectacle  will  have  been 
witnessed  in  this  land  since  it  first  asserted  its  title  to  be  called 
a  land  of  liberty.  Let  it  be  seen  that  the  American  people 
can  go  through  a  Presidential  election  freely  and  fairly,  even 
during  the  raging  storm  of  civil  war,  and  our  institutions  will 
have  had  a  glorious  triumph,  whatever  party  or  whatever 
candidate  may  suffer  a  defeat. 

.  .  .  And  here  let  me  say  that  in  this  eager  and  desperate 
determination  of  tlie  President  and  his  party  to  prolong  their 
official  supremacy  at  all  hazards,  and  even  by  the  most  un- 
blushing exercise  of  all  the  patronage  and  power  and  influ- 
ence of  the  Government  on  their  own  behalf,  I  find  renewed 
reason  for  fearing  that  they  cannot  safely  be  trusted  for  an 
early  restoration  of  '  the  Union  as  it  was,  under  the  Constitu- 
tion as  it  is.'  No  one  can  help  seeing  that  it  is  by  no  means 
for  their  interest,  as  a  party,  to  accomplish  that  result.  They 
remember  that,  after  the  election  of  President  Lincoln,  they 
would  have  been  in  a  minority  in  one,  if  not  in  both  branches 
of  Congress,  had  not  Southern  Senators  and  Representatives 
so  rashly  and  wantonly  withdrawn  from  their  seats ;  and 
they  see  plainly  that  the  return  of  the  South  to  the  family  fold 
under  the  old  Constitution  forebodes  the  end  and  upshot  of 
their  dynasty.  How,  then,  can  we  help  fearing  that  they  will 
willingly,  if  not  systematically,  postpone  a  result  which  is  so 
likely  to  cut  them  off  from  any  further  enjoyment  of  power  ? 
The  truth  is,  that  the  Republican  party  have  so  thriven  and 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  245 

fattened  on  this  rebellion,  and  it  has  brought  them  such  an 
overflowing  harvest  of  power,  patronage,  offices,  contracts, 
and  spoils,  and  they  have  become  so  enamoured  of  the  vast 
and  overshadowing  influence  which  belongs  to  an  existing 
administration  at  such  an  hour,  that  they  are  in  danger  of 
forgetting  that  their  country  is  bleeding  and  dying  on  their 
hands.  It  was  in  the  power  of  that  party,  by  giving  counte- 
nance and  encouragement  to  the  Peace  Convention  of  Febru- 
ary, 1861,  and  to  the  measures  it  proposed,  to  confine  secession 
to  South  Carolina  and  the  Gulf  States,  to  nip  rebellion  in 
the  bud,  and  to  restore  peace  within  six  months.  Instead  of 
which,  the  ultra  wing  of  that  party  stood  idly  by,  mocking  at 
every  effort  to  prevent  and  avert  this  great  and  terrible  strug- 
gle, and  rejoicing  at  the  prospect  of  a  clearer  field  for  the 
more  successful  prosecution  of  their  own  fanatical  views,  and 
for  the  more  undisputed  establishment  of  their  own  party 
supremacy.  Is  it  to  be  imagined  that  such  men  will  be  ready 
or  willing  to  co-operate  in  bringing  back  Southern  States  to 
their  old  rights  under  the  Constitution  ?  Or  is  it  proposed  to 
bring  them  back  as  desolate  and  subjugated  provinces,  to  be 
held  in  subjection  by  standing  armies  ?  Are  we  deliberately 
bent  on  having  an  American  Poland  on  this  continent?  Are 
all  our  efforts  for  the  abolition  of  black  slavery  to  end  in  estab- 
lishing a  quasi-condition  of  white  slavery  ?  Is  that  what  we 
are  fighting  for  under  the  old  Liberty  flag  of  our  fathers  ?  .  .  . 
We  all  know  that  the  Administration  has  solemnly  adopted 
the  policy  of  complete  emancipation  as  a  necessary  result  of 
the  rebellion  and  the  war.  We  all  know  that,  after  having 
rallied  the  country  for  two  years  on  the  plain,  direct,  con- 
stitutional issue  of  enforcing  the  laws  and  restoring  the  Union, 
the  President  suddenly  changed  his  hand,  and,  in  the  teeth 
of  all  his  own  declarations  and  arguments,  put  forth  a  solemn 
proclamation  of  universal  emancipation.  We  all  know  that, 
at  this  moment,  no  man  in  the  rebel  States  is  allowed  to 
return  to  his  allegiance  and  resume  his  place  as  a  loyal  citizen, 
without  swearing  to  support  this  proclamation,  and  that  the 


246  A   MEMOIR  OF 

President  has  recently  issued  a  formal  manifesto,  making 
abandonment  of  slavery  a  condition  precedent  for  even  the 
reception  of  any  proposals  for  peace.  Meantime  Mr.  Secretary 
Seward,  for  whom  I  have  nothing  but  the  kindest  feelings, 
has  expressly  admitted,  in  his  recent  speech  at  Auburn,  that 
there  are  those  of  the  Republican  party  '  who  want  guarantees 
of  swift  and  universal  and  complete  emancipation,  or  they  do 
not  want  the  nation  saved.'  Is  there  not  too  much  reason  to 
apprehend  that  this  class  of  men  is  more  numerous  than  even 
Mr.  Seward  imagines,  and  that  in  the  next  four  years  they  will 
have  acquired  —  if  they  have  not  already  acquired — a  pre- 
vailing and  paramount  influence  over  the  Administration  ? 
Mark  the  words  :  '  Men  who  want  guarantees  for  swift,  and 
universal,  and  complete  emancipation,  or  they  do  not  want 
the  nation  saved.'  And  this,  I  suppose,  is  what  these  men 
would  call  unconditional  Unionism  !  And  what  have  we 
heard  of  late  from  distinguished  Republicans  holding  high 
official  positions  in  mj  own  Commonwealth  of  Massachusetts? 
I  will  not  name  them,  to  avoid  personality,  but  I  will  give  their 
precise  language.  From  one  we  have  the  declaration  that 
*  the  appeal  from  sire  to  son  should  go  on  forever  and  forever 
until  the  last  acre  of  Southern  land,  baptized  by  Massachusetts 
blood,  should  be  rescued  from  the  infidels  to  liberty.'  From 
another  equally  distinguished  Republican  we  have  the  even 
more  distinct  declaration  that  'the  Baltimore  Convention 
and  Abraham  Lincoln  ask  something  more  than  the  Union  as 
the  condition  of  peace ; '  while  from  the  same  eminent  source 
we  are  assured  that  a  vote  for  Abraham  Lincoln  is  to  usher  in 
the  glorious  day  when  the  eloquence  of  Wendell  Phillips 
may  be  enjoyed  at  Richmond  and  Charleston,  as  it  is  now 
enjoyed  at  New  York  and  Boston.  I  may  be  told  that  this 
is  only  the  rant  and  rhapsody  of  fanatical  rhetoricians,  but  I 
cannot  so  regard  it.  What  said  the  resolutions  adopted  at  the 
same  meeting  ?  One  of  them  concluded  by  the  unequivocal 
announcement  that  '  the  war  must  go  on  until  the  pride  of 
the  [Southern]  leaders  is  humbled,  their  power  broken,  and 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  247 

the  civil  and  social  structure  of  the  South  reorganized  on  the 
basis  of  free  labor,  free  speech,  and  equal  rights  for  all  before 
the  law.'  There  can  be  no  misund-erstanding  the  import  of 
this  language.  It  is  clear,  explicit,  unequivocal.  It  does  not 
pretend  that  the  war  is  to  be  prosecuted  for  the  restoration  of 
the  Union,  but  it  expressly  declares  that  it  is  not  to  be  per- 
mitted to  cease  until  the  social  structure  of  the  South  is 
reorganized,  and  from  this  declaration  we  may  form,  I  think, 
a  pretty  distinct  idea  of  the  prospect  before  us  if  the  Repub- 
lican party  remains  in  power.  .  .  . 

There  is  not  a  man  in  the  loyal  States  who  would  not 
rejoice  with  all  his  heart  and  soul  if  African  slavery  could 
be  safely  and  legitimately  brought  to  an  end  on  this  whole 
continent ;  but  I,  for  one,  have  never  had  a  particle  of  faith 
that  a  sudden,  sweeping,  forcible  emancipation  could  result 
in  anything  but  mischief  and  misery  for  the  black  race,  as 
well  as  the  white.  The  proclamation,  however,  has  been 
issued  long  ago,  and  its  efficacy  and  its  authority  are  to 
be  the  subjects  of  future  experience  and  future  adjudica- 
tion. It  was  undoubtedly  one  of  the  greatest  stretches  of 
the  doctrine  of  necessity — it  was  unquestionably  one  of  the 
most  startling  exercises  of  the  one-man  power  —  which  the 
history  of  human  government,  free  or  despotic,  has  ever 
witnessed.  I  have  no  disposition  to  question  its  wisdom 
or  its  authority  as  a  measure  adopted  for  securing  greater 
success  to  our  arms  and  an  earlier  termination  of  the  war, 
—  though  I  cannot  help  entertaining  grave  doubts  on  both 
points.  But  the  idea  that  it  is  now  to  be  made  the  pre- 
text for  prolonging  that  war,  after  the  original  and  only 
legitimate  end  for  which  it  was  undertaken  shall  have  been 
accomplished ;  the  idea  that  we  are  to  go  on  fighting  and 
fighting  for  '  something  more  than  the  Union ; '  the  idea 
that  the  war  is  not  to  be  permitted  to  cease  until  the  whole 
social  structure  of  the  South  has  been  reorganized,  —  is  one 
abhorrent  to  every  instinct  of  my  soul,  to  every  dictate 
of  my  judgment,  to  every  principle  which  I  cherish  as  a 


248  A  MEMOIR   OF 

statesman  and  a  Christian.     It  is  a  policy,  too,  in  my  opinion, 
utterly  unconstitutional,  and  as  much  in  the  spirit  of  rebel- 
lion as  almost  anytliing  which   has  been  attempted   by  the 
Southern  States.  ...  A  solemn  oath  to  support  the  Constitu- 
tion of  the  United  States,  as  it  is,  still  rests  upon  all  our  rulers, 
and  a  solemn  obligation  upon  our  whole  people.     We  must 
pursue  constitutional  ends  by  constitutional  means.     What  a 
triumph  it  would  be  if  this  Constitution  of  our  fathers  should 
come  out,  after  all,  unscathed  from  this  fiery  trial ;  if  it  should 
be  seen  to  have  prevailed,  by  its  own  innate  original  force  and 
vigor,  over  all  the  machinations  and  assaults  of  its  enemies  ! 
How  proudly,  then,  might  we  hold  it  up  before  all  mankind, 
in  all  time  to  come,  as  we  have  in  all  time  past,  as  indeed  the 
masterpiece  of  political  and  civil  wisdom !     How  confidently 
could  we  then  challenge  all  the  world  to  show  us  a  system  of 
government  of  equal  stability  and  endurance  !    It  has  already 
stood  the  strain  of  prosperity  and  of  adversity.     Foreign  wars 
and  domestic  dissensions  have  hitherto  assailed  it  in  vain. 
The  rains  have  descended,  and  the  winds  have  blown,   and 
the  floods  have  come  and  beaten  upon  it,  but  it  has  not  been 
shaken.    The  great  final  test  is  now  upon  it,  —  rebellion,  revo- 
lution, civil  war,  in  their  most  formidable  and  appalling  shape. 
Oh,  if  we  can  but  carry  it  through  this  last  trial  unharmed, 
we  never  again  need  fear  for  its  security.     Let  us  then  hold 
it  up  —  the  Constitution,  the  whole  Constitution,  and  nothing 
but  the  Constitution  —  as  at  once  the  end  and  the  instrument 
of  all  our  efforts.     Let  us  demand  a  faithful  adherence  to  all 
its  forms  and  to  all  its  principles.     Let  us  watch  jealously  for 
the  observance  and  fulfilment  of  all  its  provisions.     And  let 
us  resolve  that  if  it  does  fail  and  fall  at  last,  it  shall  be  by  the 
madness  of  its  enemies,  and  not  by  the  supineness  or  willing 
surrender  of  its  friends ! 

The  active  support  given  by  Mr.  Winthrop  to  the 
candidacy  of  General  McClellan  was  criticised  with 
much  asperity  by  the  Republican  press.      It  was  an 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  249 

amusement  of  his  to  preserve  newspaper-cuttings  relat- 
ing to  himself  —  whether  complimentary  or  the  reverse 

—  so  far  as  they  came  to  his  notice,  and  particularly 
when  he  knew,  or  thought  he  knew,  the  names  of  the 
writers.  It  has  occurred  to  me  to  reproduce  two  such 
articles,  which  I  find  on  opposite  pages  of  the  same 
scrap-book,  —  one  associated  with  the  name  of  James 
C.  Welling,  then  editor  of  the  "  National  Intelligencer," 
afterward  President  of  Columbian  College,  Washington  ; 
the  other  with  the  name  of  a  gentleman  then  con- 
nected with  a  leading  Boston  newspaper,  for  many 
years  an  officer  of  a  distinguished  university,  and  long 
one  of  our  resident-members.  As  his  engagements  do 
not  appear  to  have  thus  far  enabled  him  to  contribute 
to  our  publications,  my  reprint  will  serve  a  double  pur- 
pose, the  article  being  a  well-written  one,  conceived, 
apparently,  more  in  sorrow  than  in  anger,  and  undoubt- 
edly reflecting  at  that  time  —  perhaps  still  reflecting 

—  the  opinions  of  many  intelligent  and  thoughtful 
persons. 

[The  "  Daily  Advertiser,"  Sept.  21,  1864.] 

"  Mr,  Winthrop  found  himself  in  rather  unusual  company 
at  the  democratic  ratification  meeting  in  New  York,  on  Sat- 
urday evening.  At  the  stand  from  which  he  addressed  his 
new  associates,  the' meeting  was  called  to  order  by  Elijah  F. 
Purdy,  '  Grand  Sachem  '  of  the  Tammany  Club.  At  a  neigh- 
boring stand  Mr.  Fernando  Wood  —  a  name  redolent  of  any- 
thing but  a  savor  of  respectability  and  patriotism  —  was 
giving  in  his  adhesion  at  the  same  time  with  Mr.  Winthrop. 
At  another,  Mr.  Oakey  Hall  was  nominating  James  Gordon 
Bennett  for  Congress.  And  at  a  third  the  notorious  Isaiah 
Rynders  was  venting  his   strenuous   eloquence   in  a  style 


250  A  MEMOIR  OF 

which  has  lost  none  of  its  repulsive  characteristics.  It  was  a 
strange  company  for  Mr.  Winthrop,  of  all  men,  to  be  found 
in.  There  could  have  been  little  in  it  to  remind  him  pleas- 
antly of  his  former  political  life.  Even  the  superlative  satis- 
faction of  being  accompanied  by  a  gentleman  (a  rare  sight  then 
and  there)  '  whom  he  had  known  for  so  many  years  as  the 
tried  and  trusty  friend  of  Daniel  Webster,'  ^  great  as  that 
charm  must  be  supposed  to  have  been  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  could 
hardly  have  compensated  him  for  an  association  so  repugnant 
to  every  old  memory  and  every  personal  trait  of  his  own,  and 
so  little  likely,  we  must  add,  to  conduce  to  Mr.  Winthrop's 
own  fame. 

"Mr.  Winthrop  has  had  his  opportunities  to  establish 
himself  in  the  goodwill,  the  confidence,  and  esteem  of  his 
fellow-citizens  such  as  few  men  have  enjoyed.  He  is  one  of 
those  men  who  seem  born  to  be  public  favorites.  There  is 
hardly  any  station  in  the  gift  of  our  people  which  did  not 
once  seem  to  be  within  his  reach.  To  not  a  few  stations  of 
high  dignity  he  has  actually  been  called,  —  not,  we  will 
remark,  by  the  suffrages  or  with  the  goodwill  of  those  with 
whom  he  now  consorts.  We  will  not  undertake  now  to  discuss 
the  reasons  for  that  gradual  and  not  quite  voluntary  with- 
drawal from  public  affairs,  which  for  some  years  back  has  left 
Mr.  Winthrop  outside  of  the  current.  There  may  have  been 
grievances  on  his  part  as  well  as  mistakes.  He  may  have 
found  it  difficult  to  accustom  himself  to  the  political  com- 
panionship and  to  the  claims  for  precedence  of  men  whom  he 
had  not  been  used  to  regard  as  his  worthy  associates,  but 
whom  the  vicissitudes  of  politics  had  made  even  more  con- 
spicuous than  himself  for  the  time,  although  perhaps  less  fully 
prepared  for  the  long  race  of  public  life.  We  cannot  con- 
ceive that  any  association  thus  brought  about  by  the  change 
of  times  and  of  issues  can  have  been  more  distasteful  than 
that  which  Mr.  Winthrop  has  now  formed;  but  still  these 
considerations,  and  such  as  these,  may  have  served  to  put  him 
^  Hon.  Hiram  Ketchum. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  251 

in  a  position  where  his  abilities  and  acquirements  were  lost  to 
the  public  service,  almost  as  much  to  the  regret  of  many  of 
his  fellow-citizens  as  to  his  own. 

The  time  came,  however,  when  Mr.  Winthrop  could  easily 
escape  from  this  false  position,  —  an  hour  when  men  of  all 
parties  were  ready  to  bury  the  past  and  to  remember  nothing 
but  present  devotion  to  a  country  in  peril.  At  the  breaking 
out  of  the  war  many  a  record,  with  blots  far  worse  than  any 
upon  Mr.  Winthrop's,  was  closed  and  a  fair  page  opened  on 
which  a  new  account  could  be  entered.  There  is  no  difficulty 
in  recalling  names  then  in  as  false  a  position  before  the  public 
as  Mr.  Winthrop's,  but  now  distinguished  by  the  public  grati- 
tude for  services  promptly  and  heartily  rendered  in  the  hour 
of  danger.  That  opportunity,  frankly  improved  according  to 
the  dictates,  we  will  not  say  of  interest  and  personal  ambi- 
tion, but  of  a  generous  patriotism,  would  have  given  Mr. 
Winthrop  a  foremost  place  in  the  regards  of  our  people.  The 
popular  judgment  asked  only  for  evidence  that  a  ready  in- 
stinct impelled  the  statesman,  even  though  retired,  to  spring 
to  the  defence  of  a  country  assailed  by  treason.  If  he  forgot 
the  past  and  remembered  only  his  country,  the  people  of  all 
parties  were  ready  to  do  the  same,  and  to  recognize  gener- 
ously all  worthy  service. 

"  It  has  been  Mr.  Winthrop's  misfortune,  or  else  his  mis- 
take, that  he  has  never  seemed  responsive  to  this  state  of 
public  feeling.  His  occasional  but  not  frequent  appearances 
in  public  have  failed  to  establish  a  sympathy  between  himself 
and  his  fellow-citizens,  with  respect  to  the  subject  which  lay 
nearest  to  their  hearts.  His  utterances,  if  they  have  not  been 
cold,  have  failed  to  convey  the  impression  of  any  spontaneous 
and  hearty  zeal,  and  thus  the  barrier  between  him  and  the 
public,  so  far  from  being  broken  down,  as  it  easily  might 
have  been,  has  been  strengthened.  It  will  not  be  overcome 
by  the  desperate  leap  which  Mr.  Winthrop  has  now  made. 
Neither  is  the  past  to  be  retrieved,  nor  the  future  secured, 
nor  any  public  service  done,  by  the  devotion  of  his  efforts  at 


252  A  MEMOIR   OF 

this  hour  to  the  advancement  of  a  candidate  on  the  Chicago 
platform.  It  is  bootless  for  Mr.  Winthrop  to  sneer  at  that 
document  as  a  '  paper  pellet  of  the  brain,  concocted  in  a  mid- 
night session  of  a  resolution-committee  during  the  hurly- 
burly  of  a  Presidential  nomination.'  The  country  does  not 
so  regard  it.     The  country  takes  the  platform  for  what  it  is, 

—  the  solemnly  declared  policy  of  a  great  party,  which  as- 
pires to  the  government  of  the  nation.  The  country  will  not 
forget  the  choice  that  is  now  made  by  any  public  man.  A 
mistake  now,  a  neglect  of  this  opportunity  to  set  himself  right 
upon  the  record,  will  be  an  error  not  to  be  retrieved. 

"  Mr.  Winthrop  is  not  alone  in  his  failure  to  improve  this 
final  occasion  for  repairing  past  errors.     There  are  other  men 

—  between  whom  and  the  public  there  has  been  a  difference 
as  to  their  deserts,  and  who  have  been  struggling  to  extricate 
themselves  from  unfortunate  entanglements  or  the  conse- 
quences of  old  mistakes  —  who  are  now  taking  the  final 
plunge.  When  the  sun  goes  down  on  the  8th  of  November, 
the  political  waters  will  close  finally  over  a  good  many  ships 
which  once  put  forth  brave  and  trim,  but  were  not  staunch 
enough  for  the  storms  of  these  later  years." 


[The  *'  National  Intelligencer,"  Sept.  24,  1864.] 

"  The  Boston  '  Daily  Advertiser,'  apparently  smarting  under 
a  sense  of  shame  at  its  present  political  association  with  black 
spirits  and  white,  —  as  the  Daniel  S.  Dickinsons,  Benjamin 
F.  Butlers,  and  John  W.  Forneys,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the 
William  Lloyd  Garrisons,  Frederick  Douglasses,  and  Lucretia 
Motts,  on  the  other,  —  has  betaken  itself,  under  the  stress  of 
an  imagined  fellow-feeling  that  makes  it  very  kind,  to  com- 
miserate the  Hon.  Robert  C.  Winthrop  on  his  present  co- 
operation with  the  Democratic  party,  and  thinks  that  Mr. 
Winthrop  must  have  found  himself  '  in  rather  unusual  com- 
pany '  at  the  immense  meeting  held  in  New  York  to  ratify 
General  McClellan's  nomination.      As  it  is  estimated  that 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  253 

nearly  one  hundred  thousand  persons  participated  in  that 
great  popular  demonstration,  we  think  it  quite  possible 
that  there  may  be  some  room  for  the  profound  observation  of 
the  '  Advertiser/  We  have  no  doubt  that  in  such  a  crowd 
many  persons  could  be  found  who  would  be  antipathetic  to  a 
gentleman  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  scholarly  tastes  and  political 
antecedents.  But  we  have  just  as  little  doubt  that  in  an  assem- 
blage which  comprised  among  its  officers  such  men  as  William 
B.  Astor,  James  Gallatin,  James  T.  Brady,  and  hosts  of 
others,  it  would  be  quite  possible  to  find  other  persons,  who, 
by  whatever  test  their  '  respectability '  may  be  tried  (even  as 
respectability  is  measured  in  Boston),  would  be  deemed  by  the 
*  Advertiser '  not  entirely  unworthy  of  political  or  social 
fellowship.  But  on  this  point  we  express  an  opinion  with 
great  diffidence.  .  .  . 

"In  reply  to  the  lament  the  'Advertiser'  utters  over  Mr. 
Winthrop,  if  there  is  anybody  in  or  out  of  Boston  who,  when- 
ever he  was  called  to  say  '  what  he  thought  of  the  Republic,' 
has  manifested  a  more  intense  or  sincere  sympathy  than  he, 
with  the  cause  of  the  country  'as  assailed  by  treason,'  we 
would  be  grateful  to  the  '  Advertiser '  for  the  indication  of 
his  name.  We  are  not  apprised  of  any  such.  And  when  our 
contemporary  says  that  '  at  the  breaking  out  of  the  war  many 
a  record,  with  blots  far  worse  than  any  upon  Mr.  Winthrop's, 
was  closed  and  a  fair  page  opened,'  there  is  nobody  who  does 
not  perceive  that  in  so  writing  the  '  Advertiser  '  merely  essays 
to  cover  the  smutches  which  cling  to  the  past  characters  of 
many  among  its  present  political  companions,  who,  after 
serving  faithfully  in  the  ranks  of  the  '  slave  Democracy  '  while 
it  had  honors  to  bestow  and  emoluments  to  offer,  are  now  the 
accepted  allies  of  our  contemporary.  It  may  well  confess, 
both  on  its  own  account  and  on  theirs,  to  some  sensibility  at 
the  '  vicissitudes  of  politics '  which  have  brought  such  a 
strange  coalition  of  incongruous  elements  in  the  bosom  of  the 
same  party ;  but  we  think  that,  as  well  on  the  score  of  estab- 
lished patriotism  as  of  consistent  adherence  to  political  prin- 


254  A  MEMOIR  OF 

ciple,   Mr.  Winthrop  has   no   indulgence  to   ask  from   any 
quarter,  and  least  of  all  from  the  '  Daily  Advertiser.' 

"  On  the  4th  of  October,  1861,  the  'Advertiser'  thought  it 
the  part  of  patriotism  and  of  political  principle  to  hold  the 
following  language ;  — 

"  '  We  are  sorry  to  see  a  disposition  in  several  quarters  to  represent  the 
Kepublican  party,  mainly  on  the  strength  of  Mr.  Sumner's  unfortunate 
speech  at  Worcester,  as  a  party  of  emancipation,  a  "John  Brown  party," 
a  party  that  desires  to  carry  on  this  war  as  a  war  of  abolition.  The 
resort  to  such  arguments  and  misrepresentations  has  a  tendency  to  weaken 
the  confidence  of  the  people  in  the  management  of  the  war,  to  inspire 
unfounded  suspicions  as  to  the  purposes  for  which  they  are  asked  to 
enlist  and  to  contribute  their  money,  and  to  lead  them  to  elevate  into 
undue  importance  the  mad  counsels  of  men  like  Mr.  Sumner,  —  a  ten- 
dency which  we  must  deeply  deplore,  not  as  Republicans,  but  as  American 
citizens,  anxious  for  the  welfare  of  our  country.  .  .  .  We  hold  it  for  an 
incontestible  truth  that  neither  men  nor  money  will  be  forthcoming  for 
this  war  if  once  the  people  are  impressed  with  the  belief  that  the  abolition 
of  slavery  and  not  the  defence  of  the  Union  is  its  object,  and  that  its 
original  purpose  is  to  be  converted  into  a  cloak  for  some  new  design  of 
seizing  this  opportunity  for  the  destruction  of  the  social  system  of  the 
South.  The  people  are  heart  and  soul  with  their  Government  in  support 
of  any  constitutional  undertaking ;  we  do  not  believe  that  they  will  follow 
it,  if  they  are  made  to  suspect  that  they  are  being  decoyed  into  the  support 
of  any  unconstitutional  and  revolutionary  designs.' 

"  It  is  possible,  we  submit,  that,  without  entirely  forfeiting 
the  character  of  a  patriot,  Mr.  Winthrop  may  think  now  as 
the  '  Advertiser '  thought  less  than  three  years  ago.  He  may 
have  now,  as  the  'Advertiser'  had  in  the  month  of  October, 
1861,  no  taste  for  consorting  with  '  a  party  of  emancipation,' 
a  '  John  Brown  party,'  a  '  party  that  desires  to  carry  on  this 
war  as  an  Abolition  war.'  He  may  think  now,  as  the  '  Adver- 
tiser' professed  to  think  in  1861,  that  the  counsels  of  Mr. 
Sumner  were  '  mad ; '  and  now  that  these  counsels,  under 
the  acknowledged  leadership  of  that  distinguished  Senator, 
are  paramount  in  the  legislation  and  military  operations  of 
the  country,  Mr.  Winthrop  may  deplore  them,  like  the 
'Advertiser'  in  October,  1861,  not  as  the  adherent  of  any 
party,  but  '  as  an  American  citizen,  anxious  for  the  welfare 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  255 

of  our  country.'  It  may  be  that  Mr.  Winthrop,  in  the  '  vicis- 
situdes of  politics,'  has  not  been  able,  like  the  '  Daily  Adver- 
tiser,' to  accomplish  the  Irish  feat  of  'turning  his  back  on 
himself,'  and  hence,  to  change  the  figure,  while  he  sees  some 
people  willing  to  trim  their  sail  to  every  breeze  that  blows, 
he  may  have  been  content  to  drop  '  outside  of  the  current,' 
which,  in  wafting  him  to  political  promotion,  he  may  fear, 
even  as  the  '  Advertiser '  professed  to  fear,  will  lead  to  the 
wreck  of  the  Union  and  the  ruin  of  his  country.  As  the 
'  Advertiser '  is  at  some  loss  to  account  for  the  '  considerations ' 
which  have  seemed  to  put  him  in  a  position  where  his  abilities 
and  acquirements  are  lost  to  the  public  service,  we  beg  to 
suggest  that  a  sufficient  explanation  of  the  melancholy  fact 
(for  it  is  a  melancholy  fact)  may  be  found  in  the  steadfast- 
ness with  which  he  has  maintained  his  political  principles. 
If  by  such  constancy  and  fidelity  he  is  now  placed  in  a  '  false 
position'  before  the  public,  it  can  only  be  a  public  which 
counts  political  tergiversation  among  the  virtues  of  patriotism, 
and  holds  apostasy  to  principle  in  higher  esteem  than  honest 
convictions  maintained  at  any  cost. 

"  If  the  '  Advertiser,'  in  its  search  for  the  '  considerations ' 
which  may  have  induced  Mr.  Winthrop  to  stand  aloof  from 
the  prevailing  political  influences  in  Massachusetts,  and  in  the 
present  Administration,  should  need  further  light  on  the  sub- 
ject, it  may  perhaps  derive  additional  illumination  from  its  own 
columns.  For  instance,  on  the  7th  of  October,  1861,  returning 
to  the  subject  then,  as  now,  uppermost  in  the  thoughts  of 
conservative  men,  it  held  the  following  language :  — 

" '  The  history  of  the  aiitislavery  movement  in  this  country  will  hereafter 
rank  as  one  of  the  strongest  cases  where  human  impatience  and  devotion 
to  a  Utopian  idea  has  blinded  men's  eyes  to  the  practical  good  which 
Providence  has  placed  ready  at  hand.  The  insane  folly  of  the  abolition- 
ists killed  out  years  ago  the  emancipation  party  which  at  one  time  had 
the  actual  control  of  Virginia,  and  promised  to  eradicate  slavery  in  other 
Border  States.  The  over-nice  scruples  of  the  same  extremists  some  years 
later  elected  Mr.  Polk  and  insured  the  consummation  of  the  Texas 
scheme,  which  they  affected  to  deprecate.     Their  follies  and  excesses  have 


256  A   MEMOIR   OF 

still  later  furnished  the  Southern  extremists  and  their  allies  with  a  whole 
arsenal  of  weapons,  which  have  been  turned  without  reason  but  with 
marked  effect  against  the  Republicans,  the  only  political  party  which  has 
pretended  to  recognize  any  moral  duty  connected  with  slavery  as  resting 
upon  the  nation  or  upon  the  citizens  of  the  Free  States.  What  the 
abolitionists  affected  to  desire,  that  they  have  prevented;  what  they 
affected  to  deprecate,  that  they  have  insured.  Those  who  wished  to  do 
something  in  the  only  practical  way  against  the  extension  of  slavery  they 
have  weakened  and  loaded  with  a  heavy  weight  of  odium.  The  same  folly 
is  now  repeated  by  those  who  urge  the  conversion  of  this  war  into  a  war  for 
emancipation.  They  clamor  for  a  blow  to  be  struck  against  slavery  itself, 
unmindful  that  Providence  has  already  foreshadowed  the  decay  and  end 
of  that  institution  in  such  terms  as  are  clearly  intelligible  even  to  human 
apprehension.  They  are  eager  to  be  made  the  instruments  of  God's 
displeasure  against  an  abhorred  system,  neglecting  the  palpable  deter- 
mination of  Providence  that  the  system  shall  perish  by  the  suicidal  folly 
of  those  who  uphold  it.  No  more  instructive  lesson  could  be  left  for 
future  imitators  of  the  selfishness,  arrogance,  and  wickedness  of  the 
ruling  Southern  interest  than  is  given  in  its  destruction  by  its  own  hands 
and  in  consequence  of  its  own  grasping  and  treacherous  conduct ;  but 
foolish  zealots  would  fain  weaken  the  force  of  this  example,  and  would 
leave  it  for  future  ages  to  believe  that  wickedness  has  perished,  not  by 
its  own  venom,  but  by  some  external  interference.' 

"  What  if  Mr.  Winthrop,  with  the  additional  lights  now  be- 
fore him,  setting  its  truth  in  the  blaze  of  a  noonday  sun,  should 
think  now,  as  the  '  Advertiser'  thought  in  1861,  that  '  the  folly 
of  those  who  urged  the  conversion  of  this  war  into  an  emanci- 
pation war '  is  the  same  '  insane  folly '  which  at  other  periods 
in  our  history  '  has  blinded  men's  eyes  to  the  practical  good 
which  Providence  has  placed  ready  to  hand '  ?  What  if  Mr. 
Winthrop  should  think  now,  as  the  '  Advertiser '  thought  on 
the  7th  of  October,  1861,  that  it  is  only  '  foolish  zealots  '  who 
would  fain  weaken  a  great  historical  lesson  by  thrusting  them- 
selves forward  where  they  are  not  wanted,  to  '  make  themselves 
the  instruments  of  God's  displeasure  against  an  abhorred 
system,'  thereby  'neglecting  the  palpable  determination  of 
Providence  that  the  system  should  perish  by  the  suicidal  folly 
of  those  who  uphold  it '  ?  Shall  it  be  cited  to  the  reproach  of 
Mr.  Winthrop  that,  after  more  than  three  years  of  war,  when 
the  '  insane  folly '  against  which  the   '  Advertiser '  prophe- 


ROBERT   C.   WIXTHROP.  257 

sied  in  October,  1861,  has  become  history  written  in  blood, 
he  should  be  only  more  and  more  of  the  same  mind  that  he 
was  in  1861  ?  Is  it  required  that  he  should  add  self -stultifica- 
tion to  the  odium  of  political  inconsistency,  in  order  to  estab- 
lish a  status  for  sagacity,  according  to  the  notion  of  that  useful 
quality  current  among  certain  people  in  Boston?  We  ask  the 
question.     It  is  one  for  others  to  answer." 

Extracts  from  Mr.  Winthrop's  letters  are  again 
resumed :  — 

[Oct.  23,  1864.]  Thanks  for  your  compliments  to  speeches 
with  which  you  do  not  altogether  agree.  As  to  the  New 
York  meeting  and  your  indisposition  to  '  train  in  such  com- 
pany,' I  think  I  could  find  as  bad  company  on  the  other  side. 
At  any  rate,  among  the  officers  or  speakers  at  that  meeting 
were  James  Gallatin,  William  H.  Aspinwall,  Royal  Phelps, 
John  Jacob  Astor,  Henry  Grinnell,  our  old  friend  Tallmadge, 
and  other  Conservative  men  of  high  standing,  to  say  nothing 
of  Gov.  Joel  Parker  of  New  Jersey  and  Judge  Daly.  In 
accepting  the  invitation,  however,  I  did  not  look  to  the  com- 
pany, but  to  the  Cause,  and  I  could  come  to  no  other  conclu- 
sion after  giving  the  subject  my  best  consideration.  The 
chance  of  electing  McClellan  is  a  very  small  one,  but  the 
movement  has  done  good  already  by  stirring  up  the  Adminis- 
tration, and  through  them  the  Army.  Sheridan's  victory  was 
the  first  fruits,  and  I  hope  Richmond  will  soon  fall.  If  we 
can  frighten  the  Administration  into  finishing  up  the  war 
themselves,  instead  of  prolonging  it  (as  I  think  they  have 
heretofore  been  willing  to  do)  in  order  to  accomplish  their 
peculiar  policy  and  secure  their  own  re-election,  the  result 
will  be  for  the  benefit  of  all  concerned.  A  very  insolent  tone 
prevails  here  towards  all  who  cannot  find  it  in  their  conscience 
to  support  Lincoln.  I  was  fully  prepared  to  encounter  abuse, 
but  I  have  been  a  good  deal  disgusted  by  the  patronizing  tone 
of  a  letter  in  the  '  Advertiser,'  purporting  to  come  from  a  *  sor- 

17 


258  A  MEMOIR   OF 

rowful '  friend  of  mine,  who  expressed  the  hope  that,  in  view  of 
my  '  honorable  antecedents  and  pure  personal  character,'  my 
'  defection '  might  be  received  in  silence !  Defection  from  what  ? 
Not  from  the  Republican  party,  which  I  never  consented  to 
join,  —  nor  certainly  from  the  Democratic  party,  with  which 
I  have  never  voted,  save  as  a  choice  of  evils.  The  McClellan 
managers,  by  the  bye,  think  so  well  of  my  New  London  speech 
that  they  have  had  it  stereotyped,  and,  besides  my  own  edition, 
200,000  copies  are  being  circulated  as  campaign  documents. 
I  fear  you  will  not  apply  for  many  extra  ones.  My  nomina- 
tion at  the  head  of  the  Democratic  electoral  ticket  in  this 
State  was  without  my  knowledge,  but,  feeling  as  I  did,  I 
could  not  refuse  it,  though  I  was  sorry  to  be  placed  in  a  sort 
of  antagonistic  position  to  Everett.  At  the  time  I  started 
for  New  York,  he  did  not  seem  to  have  quite  made  up  his 
mind  with  regard  to  his  own  course,  and  we  have  since  agreed 
that  nothing  shall  disturb  those  personal  relations  which  have 
so  long*  existed  between  us.  This  is  a  time  when  men  must 
think  for  themselves  and  act  upon  their  own  convictions. 
Misrepresentation  apart,  I  have  no  fear  of  my  war  record, 
and  if  T  ever  spoke  from  the  depths  of  my  own  convictions 
it  has  been  in  this  canvass. 

[Nov.  7.]  Yesterday's  mail  brought  me  a  New.  York 
'  Times '  of  the  5th,  containing  a  tirade  against  myself  a 
column  long,  as  well  as  a  notification  that  I  had  just  been 
elected  in  the  same  city  a  Vice-President  of  the  American 
Bible  Society.  Thus  the  bane  and  the  antidote  may  be  said 
to  have  come  together.  To-day  I  get  from  anonymous  sources 
two  clippings  without  date,  by  which  it  appears  that  our  old 
acquaintance  the  Howadji  is  belaboring  me  in  different  parts 
of  the  countiy,  using  as  a  stick  the  name  and  fame  of  my 
poor  kinsman  Theodore.  It  appears,  this  time,  that  I  am 
'  a  follower  of  Calhoun,'  who  must  be  a  good  deal  tickled  by 
this  assertion  if  he  is  in  any  condition  to  appreciate  its  humor. 
I  don't  think  Curtis  really  means  to  be  unfair,  and  I  rather 
like  him.  In  fact,  if  all  accounts  are  true,  I  like  him  better 
than  President  Lincoln  does. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  259 

As  the  allusions  in  tlie  foregoing  extract  may  be 
obscure  to  some  readers,  it  is  as  well  to  mention  that 
our  late  corresponding  member^  George  William  Curtis, 
was  long  familiarly  known  as  "  the  Howadji/'  from  the 
titles  of  two  of  his  early  works,  and  that  an  amusing 
story  —  probably  exaggerated  —  was  continually  crop- 
ping up  in  the  newspapers  to  the  effect  that  Abraham 
Lincoln  originally  conceived  an  unreasoning  distaste 
for  his  society,  on  account  of  his  habit  of  parting  his 
hair  in  the  middle,  —  a  practice  which  then  savored 
of  effeminacy  to  the  unsophisticated  Western  mind. 
In  the  first  volume  of  Mr.  Curtis' s  Orations  and  Ad- 
dresses, published  in  1893,  will  be  found  a  lecture  on 
''  Political  Infidelity,"  stated  by  the  editor  to  have  been 
"  delivered  more  than  fifty  times  in  the  course  of  1864 
and  1865,"  in  which  Mr.  Winthrop  figures  to  the  extent 
of  a  couple  of  pages,  from  which  I  quote  the  following 
spirited  outburst :  — 

"  Young  men  of  Massachusetts,  young  men  of  New  England, 
two  Winthrops  appeal  to  you  in  this  hour  of  national  peril, 
both  intelligent,  refined,  accomplished.  The  one  living,  sup- 
ported by  Fernando  Wood  and  Isaiah  Rynders,  cheered  by 
Jefferson  Davis  and  every  rebel,  by  the  London  '  Times '  and 
the  men  who  built  and  sailed  and  fought  the  '  Alabama,'  by 
every  enemy  of  the  American  government  and  principle  in 
the  world,  —  it  is  Robert  C.  Winthrop,  who  follows  John  C. 
Calhoun,  and  bids  you  follow  him.  The  other  dead,  fallen  in 
the  first  fierce  battle  of  the  war  to  maintain  the  government, 
dead  in  his  beautiful  youth,  full  of  hope,  full  of  faith,  full  of 
fidelity  to  the  American  principle  and  the  American  people, 
beckoning  to  you  as  he  beckoned  to  his  brave  boys  in  the  very 
moment  when  he  fell  forward  into  death  and  glory,  —  it  is 
Theodore  Winthrop,  who  follows  liberty  and  the  Union,  and 
who  whispers  to  you,  'Follow  me,  follow  me.'  " 


260  A   MEMOIR   OF 

The  article  in  the  New  York  "  Times/'  ahove  alluded 
to,  is  headed  "  Degenerate  Sons/'  and  is  also  too  long 
to  cite  in  full,  but  its  most  stinging  passage  is  the 
following :  — 

"  The  student  of  history  hereafter  will  hear  with  profound 
surprise  that  the  purest  of  the  New  England  Puritans,  in  the 
great  crisis  of  his  country's  history,  placed  himself  on  the  side 
of  oppression  against  the  party  of  liberty,  excusing  slavery, 
misrepresenting  its  opponents,  urging  a  base  compromise  and 
a  peace  which  would  have  ^vrecked  liberty  and  country  alto- 
gether, condemning  that  legislation  which  will  be  the  admira- 
tion of  all  time,  and  throwing  the  influence  of  an  accomplished 
scholar  and  gentleman,  and  of  a  name  most  respected  for  its 
association  with  the  upholding  of  human  rights,  on  the  side  of 
a  most  base,  cowardly,  reactionary,  and  oppressive  party,  which 
would  willingly  see  the  whole  North  beneath  a  slave  oligarchy. 
We  can  imagine  how  that  stern  old  Puritan,  John  Winthrop, 
who  was  ready  to  choose  a  wilderness  for  conscience'  sake, 
would  frown  on  this  unworthy  position  of  his  descendant. 
How  he  can  reconcile  it  with  his  reason,  his  knowledge,  or 
his  conscience,  we  do  not  wish  to  know.  We  regret  it  most 
for  his  own  sake,  and  the  sake  of  a  noble,  historic  name." 

Extracts  from  Mr.  Winthrop' s  letters  are  here 
resumed :  — 

[Nov.  16,  1864.]  I  have  received  from  you  neither  letter 
of  sympathy  nor  visit  of  consolation  ;  but  if  you  read  my  little 
speech  at  the  Sailors'  Fair  the  night  after  the  election,  you 
will  see  that  my  equanimity  has  not  been  seriously  disturbed. 
I  confess  that  I  hoped  we  should  have  received  a  larger  share 
of  the  electoral  vote,  but  it  would  have  been  little  short  of  a 
miracle  to  have  prevailed  against  all  the  power  and  patronage 
of  the  Administration,  civil  and  military.  If  it  be  true,  as  I 
hear  it  credibly  stated,  that  McClellan's  popular  vote  is  larger 
than  that  of  Lincoln  in  1860,  and  that  a  change  of  only  30,000 


EGBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  261 

votes,  judiciously  sprinkled  over  different  States,  would  have 
reversed  the  result,  it  is  certainly  something  to  be  proud  of,  — 
or,  as  some  people  might  prefer  to  say,  something  to  be 
ashamed  of.  You  claim,  to  be  sure,  most  of  the  good  com- 
pany ;  but  as  I  found  myself  associated  at  the  polls  here  with 
such  men  as  Dr.  James  Jackson,  Benjamin  R.  Curtis,  George 
W.  Lyman,  Ticknor,  William  H.  Gardiner,  William  Gray, 
Colonel  Aspinwall,  Chandler  Robbins,  Dr.  Blagden,  Hillard, 
and  others  of  whom  I  spare  you  the  enumeration,  I  am 
content,  —  however  much  I  may  regret  that  you  and  Everett 
and  Levi  Lincoln,  and  a  hundred  others,  thought  differently. 
At  any  rate,  I  rejoice  that  the  election  is  safely  over,  and  that 
Sumner's  brutal  speech  has  not  been  accepted  as  the  keynote 
to  the  policy  of  the  victors.  Everybody  else  has  spoken  with 
moderation  and  good  feeling.  The  President,  especially, 
received  the  announcement  of  his  election  in  a  manner  to 
conciliate  every  one.  I  don't  know  that  I  can  quite  indorse 
all  that  Everett  said  of  him  last  evening ;  but  as  I  came  in 
for  a  share  of  the  compliments  of  that  speech,  I  can  hardly 
question  its  justice. 

[Dec.  10.]  I  dined  yesterday  with  William  Amory  —  the 
Friday  Club  —  all  of  whom,  as  it  turned  out,  had  voted 
McClellan  except  Agassiz  and  Chief  Justice  Bigelow.  Caleb 
Cushing  was  there  as  a  guest,  but  his  politics  I  doubt  if  any 
one  can  accurately  define  except  himself.  He  and  I  walked 
home  together  about  midnight,  when  he  volunteered  the 
remark  that  my  New  London  speech  was  the  most  effective 
one  on  that  side,  and  that  if  McClellan's  cause  had  been  uni- 
formly advocated  in  the  same  spirit,  and  the  campaign  run  on 
those  lines,  he  might  have  been  triumphantly  elected.  I  had 
already  learned,  on  good  authority,  that  both  Lincoln  and 
Seward  had  expressed  a  substantially  similar  opinion,  which 
I  consider  one  of  the  greatest  compliments  ever  paid  me, 
there  being  no  better  judges  of  the  ability  of  campaign 
speeches  than  these  three  men.  Do  not,  however,  repeat  all 
this  as  coming  from  me,  as  it  would  only  sound  like  vanity 


262  A  MEMOIR   OF 

on  my  part ;  but  it  must  one  day  go  on  record.  Speaking  of 
McClellan,  I  only  recently  read  a  letter  of  his  to  William  H. 
Aspinwall,  written  before  his  nomination,  which  confirms 
all  I  had  believed  in  regard  to  his  views.  To  my  mind, 
Everett's  speech  to  the  electors  gives  undeserved  importance 
to  the  letter  of  Alexander  H.  Stephens.  I  like  Stephens 
personally,  but  I  think  he  always  writes  for  momentary 
effect,  and  he  has  written  on  both  sides  of  the  Rebellion. 
He  is  a  man  of  impulse  and  prejudice,  who  has  long  been 
at  odds  with  Jefferson  Davis.  Furthermore,  Everett's  sug- 
gestion that  there  was  '  no  display  of  force '  at  the  late  elec- 
tion does  not  seem  to  me  quite  accurate,  in  view  of  the  cannon 
at  the  corners  of  the  streets  in  Providence  and  Butler's  array 
of  regiments  in  New  York. 

[Jan.  22,  1865.]  I  am  very  glad  that  you  and  other  friends 
are  so  well  pleased  with  what  you  are  good  enough  to  call 
'  the  justice  and  the  eloquence '  of  my  tribute  to  Everett  at 
Faneuil  Hall.  I  was  better  satisfied  with  it  myself  than  I 
generally  am  with  my  own  efforts,  and  I  certainly  spoke  from 
my  whole  heart.  His  death  was  a  great  shock  to  me,  and  I 
shall  miss  him  profoundly.  When  I  first  entered  the  Legis- 
lature he  honored  me  with  a  flattering  degree  of  confidence, 
and  for  some  thirty  years  back  he  has  been  perhaps  the  one 
man,  living  here  in  Boston,  upon  whose  united  regard  and 
prudence,  upon  whose  commingled  '  blood  and  judgment,'  as 
Shakspere  hath  it,  I  could  rely  at  a  pinch.  If,  early  in  my 
career,  I  had  made  a  speech  and  were  about  to  print  it,  —  or 
had  written  an  address  and  were  about  to  deliver  it,  —  I  could 
send  it  freely  and  confidently  for  his  examination,  sure  that 
his  friendship  would  induce  him  to  make  any  suggestions 
which  he  thought  for  my  advantage,  while  his  judgment  was 
a  guaranty  that  they  would  be  good  and  reasonable.  In  later 
life  we  had  one  or  two  differences  of  opinion  upon  public 
questions,  but  they  never  cast  even  a  momentary  shadow 
over  our  relations.  His  uniform  kindness  and  confidence 
continued  to  the  end.     Of  his  scholarship  and  his  oratory  I 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  263 

was,  as  you  know,  a  warm  admirer.  I  delighted  in  listening 
to  him  on  great  occasions,  considering  him,  in  his  peculiar 
line,  unrivalled. 

On  the  4th  of  April,  1865,  by  invitation  of  the  City 
Council,  Mr.  Winthrop  was  one  of  the  speakers  at  a 
Faneuil  Hall  meeting  to  celebrate  the  fall  of  Richmond, 
with  reference  to  which  I  find  the  following  entry  in  his 
diary  :  — 

No  Conservative  spoke  but  myself.  Frederick  Douglass 
(whom  I  never  saw  before)  did  well,  and  other  colored  men 
took  part.  It  was  odd  company  for  me,  but  I  can  rejoice  at 
the  success  of  the  Union  arms  in  any  company. 

His  remarks  were  necessarily  brief,  and,  after  some 
expressions  of  congratulation  suitable  to  the  occasion, 
he  added  :  — 

Let  me  express  the  hope  that  in  all  our  rejoicings,  now  and 
hereafter,  we  shall  exhibit  a  spirit  worthy  of  those  who  recog- 
nize a  Divine  Hand  in  what  has  occurred.  Let  no  boastful 
exultations  mingle  with  our  joy ;  no  brutal  vindictiveness 
tarnish  our  triumph.  Let  us  indulge  no  spirit  of  vengeance 
or  of  extermination  toward  the  conquered,  nor  breathe  out 
threatenings  and  slaughter  against  foreign  nations.  The 
great  work  of  war  accomplished,  the  even  greater  work  of 
peace  will  remain  to  be  undertaken,  and  it  will  demand  all  our 
energies  and  all  our  endurance.  Let  us  show  our  gratitude 
to  God  by  doing  all  we  can  to  mitigate  the  sorrows  and  suffer- 
ings of  those  upon  whom  the  calamities  of  war  have  fallen. 
Let  us  exert  ourselves  with  fresh  zeal  in  ministering  to  the 
sick  and  wounded,  in  binding  up  the  broken  hearts,  in  pro- 
viding for  widows  and  orphans,  for  refugees  and  freedmen, 
in  reuniting,  as  fast  and  as  far  as  we  can,  the  chords  of  friend- 
ship and  good-will  wherever  they  have  been  shattered  or  swept 
away,  and  thus  exhibit  our  land  in  that  noblest  of  all  atti- 


264  A  MEMOIR  OF 

tudes,  —  the  only  attitude  worthy  of  a  Christian  nation,  — 
that  of  seeking  to  restore  and  to  maintain  peace  and  brother- 
hood at  home  and  abroad.  Thus  only  can  our  triumph  be 
worthily  celebrated. 

Six  days  later,  on  the  10th  of  April,  he  was  invited 
to  address  a  similar  meeting,  in  celebration  of  Lee's 
surrender ;  but  he  was  about  starting  for  New  York  to 
attend  the  funeral  of  a  young  kinsman  of  his,  Frederick 
Winthrop,  who,  after  a  brilliant  military  career,  during 
which  he  had  attained  the  rank  of  Brigadier-General, 
had  just  been  killed  at  Five  Forks.  Two  days  after  his 
return  came  the  news  of  President  Lincoln's  assassina- 
tion, the  circumstances  of  which  were  so  atrocious,  and 
the  grief  excited  by  his  loss  so  intense,  as  to  create,  for 
the  time  being,  in  some  quarters,  a  feeling  of  resentment 
against  persons  who  had  been  prominent  in  opposing  his 
re-election,  of  whom,  in  Massachusetts,  Mr.  Winthrop 
had  been  chief.  He  was  privately  waited  on  by  a 
Republican  friend,  who  explained  that  not  only  had 
remonstrances  been  made  against  his  being  asked  to 
speak  at  Faneuil  Hall  on  the  subject,  but  that  it  was 
thought  wise  for  him  to  make  his  health  an  excuse  for 
not  being  present  at  the  meeting,  lest  in  the  inflamed 
state  of  the  public  mind  he  should  be  subjected  to  some 
manifestation  of  disrespect.  He  replied  that,  so  far  as 
speaking  was  concerned,  he  much  preferred  to  pay  a 
tribute  to  Mr.  Lincoln  later  and  in  his  own  way,  but 
that  his  absence  on  such  an  occasion  might  be  mis- 
construed. He  accordingly  attended  on  foot,  and  was 
unable  to  perceive,  either  in  the  streets  or  on  the  plat- 
form, that  he  was  treated  with  anything  but  courtesy. 
At  the  Annual  Meeting  of  this  Society,  a  few  days  after- 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  265 

ward,  in  introducing,  on  behalf  of  the  Standing  Com- 
mittee, a  series  of  patriotic  resolutions,  he  took  occasion 
to  say :  — 

The  awful  crime  which  was  perpetrated  at  Washington  on 
Friday  last  would  have  filled  our  hearts  with  horror,  even  had 
it  only  involved  the  life  of  any  of  the  humblest  of  our  fellow- 
citizens.  But  it  has  taken  from  us  the  chosen  Chief  Magis- 
trate of  the  nation,  —  the  man  who,  of  all  other  men,  could 
be  least  spared  to  the  administration  of  our  government,  — 
the  man  who  was  most  trusted,  most  relied  on,  most  beloved 
by  the  loyal  people  of  the  Union.  Beyond  all  doubt,  the  life 
of  President  Lincoln  was  a  thousandfold  the  most  precious  life 
in  our  whole  land ;  and  there  are  few  of  us,  I  think,  who  would 
not  willingly  have  rescued  it  at  the  risk,  or  even  at  the  sacri- 
fice, of  our  own.  The  cheerful  courage,  the  shrewd  sagacity, 
the  earnest  zeal,  the  imperturbable  good-nature,  the  untiring 
fidelity  to  duty,  the  ardent  devotion  to  the  Union,  the  firm 
reliance  upon  God  which  he  has  displayed  during  his  whole 
administration ;  and  the  eminent  moderation  and  magnanimity, 
both  towards  political  opponents  and  public  enemies,  which  he 
has  manifested  since  his  recent  and  triumphant  re-election, 
—  have  won  for  him  a  measure  of  regard,  of  respect,  and  of 
affection,  such  as  no  other  man  of  our  age  has  ever  enjoyed. 
The  appalling  and  atrocious  crime,  of  which  he  has  been  the 
victim,  will  only  deepen  the  impression  of  his  virtues  and  his 
excellences,  and  he  will  go  down  to  history  with  the  double 
crown  of  the  foremost  patriot  and  the  foremost  martyr  of  this 
great  struggle  against  treason  and  rebellion. 

It  so  happened  that  the  volume  of  Mr.  Winthrop's 
collected  addresses  and  speeches  covering  the  period  of 
the  civil  war  was  published  in  1867,  during  a  long 
absence  of  his  in  Europe,  and  when  he  was  not  in  the 
way  of  observing  all  that  was  said  of  it  by  the  press. 
Of  the  notices  which  reached  him  the  most  discriminating 


266  A  MEMOIR  OF 

was  one  which  appeared  in  the  "  Round  Table,"  a  short- 
lived New  York  weekly, —  a  notice  headed  "Robert  C. 
Winthrop/'  too  long  to  quote,  —  combining  many  com- 
pliments with  some  pleasant  satire^  and  apparently  from 
the  pen  of  a  total  stranger,  as  the  writer  says  in 
opening :  — 

"  No  one,  of  course,  could  keep  even  the  surface  run  of  poli- 
tics without  knowing  Mr.  Winthrop's  name,  as  the  head  of 
the  anti-radicals  of  Massachusetts,  —  that  dauntless,  out- 
numbered few,  that  phalanx  of  political  nine-pins,  standing 
up  heroically  at  each  election  to  be  bowled  over  as  part  of 
the  national  game  of  suffrage.  But  to  our  remembrance  we 
had  never  before  read  or  heard  a  speech  of  his,  and  he  was  to 
us  as  merely  historical  a  character  as  Lycurgus." 

To  his  own  copy  of  this  article  Mr.  Winthrop  ap- 
pended some  manuscript  comments,  from  which  I 
extract  the  following:  — 

Few  cleverer  things  than  this  have  ever  been  written 
about  me  or  my  books.  The  sharp  contrast  presented  be- 
tween what  I  said  in  opposing  President  Lincoln's  re-election, 
in  October,  1864,  and  what  I  said  of  him  after  his  assassina- 
tion, in  April,  1865,  is  very  telling,  and  I  perceived  this 
would  be  so  when  the  volume  went  to  press.  But  the  change 
was  not  so  much  in  my  opinions  as  in  the  attitude  of  Mr. 
Lincoln.  Nothing  is  more  certain  —  or,  at  least,  more  clear  to 
my  own  mind  —  than  that,  during  the  last  six  months  of  his 
life,  his  whole  policy  was  modified,  if  not  absolutely  reversed. 
The  strong  opposition  which  was  made  to  his  re-election,  and 
even  to  his  nomination,  would  seem  to  have  awakened  him  to 
a  sense  that  he  must  adopt  a  new  course.  He  abandoned  all 
interference  with  his  generals.  He  gave  Grant  carte  blanche^ 
and  allowed  him  to  carry  on  the  campaign  entirely  on  mili- 
tary principles,   manifesting   meantime  a  most  amiable  and 


TvOBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  267 

conciliatory  disposition  toward  the  South,  and  seemingly  ready 
to  exert  all  his  influence  to  secure  peace.  He  even  took  his 
carpet-bag  and  went  down  to  James  River  to  meet  the  South- 
ern Commissioners,  in  order  to  leave  nothing  undone  to  pro- 
mote this  result.  Those  who  had  opposed  his  re-election  might 
thus  deplore  his  loss  without  a  particle  of  inconsistency,  and 
his  death  by  the  bullet  of  a  madman  took  away  all  heart  for 
remembering  anything  but  his  virtues  and  his  patriotism. 

[July  23,  1865.]  From  what  little  I  have  seen  of  con- 
tested elections  in  England,  I  imagine  it  is  not  uncommon 
there  for  public  men  to  be  unexpectedly  hooted ;  but  after  a 
somewhat  stirring  political  career  of  more  than  thirty  years 
in  this  country,  I  met  with  my  first  experience  of  anything  of 
the  sort  the  other  day,  and,  of  all  places  in  the  world,  at 
Harvard.  Two  years  ago,  as  you  may  remember,  I  resigned 
my  Presidency  of  the  Alumni,  but  I  still  attend  their  meet- 
ings, and  I  made  a  point  of  being  present  at  the  one  on 
Commencement  Day,  as  matters  connected  with  the  proposed 
Memorial  Hall  were  to  be  discussed.  Holmes,  who  succeeded 
me  as  President,  was  late  in  arriving ;  and  not  to  delay  business, 
some  one  suggested  that  I,  as  ex-President,  should  take  the 
chair,  which,  as  a  purely  temporary  and  pro  forma  arrange- 
ment, I  proceeded  to  do ;  when,  from  different  quarters,  there 
proceeded  a  perceptible  number  of  grunts  (I  will  not  call 
them  groans)  of  disapproval.  I,  of  course,  took  no  notice, 
and  proceeded  with  the  business  until  Holmes  arrived ;  but  on 
subsequently  asking  Charles  G.  Loring  what  it  meant,  he 
frankly  told  me  that  there  still  exists  soreness  about  my  oppo- 
sition to  Lincoln,  and  that  protests  had  been  made  against  my 
being  asked  to  speak  at  the  Commemoration  exercises  two 
days  later.  I  had  no  wish  to  speak  there,  —  indeed,  as  a  rule, 
I  am  too  often  asked  to  speak  and  decline  half  my  invita- 
tions,—  but  the  little  demonstration  I  have  described  is 
significant  of  the  temper  of  the  times.  Undeterred  by 
it,  I  returned  to  Cambridge  on  Friday,  breakfasted  with 
General  Meade  at  the  Porcellian  Club,  and  assisted  at  the 


268  A   MEMOIR   OF 

exercises  and  dinner.  It  was  a  fine  occasion,  richly  merited 
by  our  young  heroes,  but  we  sadly  missed  Everett  for  the 
eloquence.  .  .  .  Our  New  England  people  are  full  of  appre- 
hension that  the  Union  is  to  be  restored  too  soon,  and  that 
the  Southern  States  are  about  to  reorganize  themselves  upon 
their  old  principles.  For  myself,  I  do  not  see  what  Johnson 
could  do  except  what  he  is  doing  and  has  done.  The  idea  of 
holding  the  South  in  subjection  for  an  indefinite  period,  until 
negro  suffrage  can  be  forced  upon  them,  is  abhorrent  to  me. 
Punish  the  immediate  authors  and  abettors  of  the  rebellion  if 
you  will,  but  it  will  not  be  wise  to  make  too  many  martyrs 
for  the  South  to  canonize.  It  should  be  remembered,  more- 
over, how  many  Southern  statesmen  have  been  educated  to  the 
doctrine  of  State  Rights  and  Secession,  and  that  what,  from  our 
point  of  view,  would  have  been  criminal,  was  with  them  the 
simple  carrying  out  of  their  own  conscientious  convictions. 


XI. 

A  great  happiness  was  in  store  for  Mr.  Winthrop  in 
his  marriage,  Nov.  15,  1865,  to  Adele,  widow  of  John 
Eliot  Thayer  of  Boston,  and  daughter  of  Francis  Granger 
of  Canandaigua,  one  of  the  most  valued  of  his  political 
and  personal  friends.-^  He  had  known  her  from  girlhood. 
They  had  in  common  hosts  of  friends,  a  real  love  of 
hospitality  and  cultivated  social  intercourse,  coupled 
with  an  active  interest  in  the  promotion  of  charitable 
and  religious  undertakings  ;  but  fortunately  they  were 

^  Francis  Granger  was  candidate  for  A^'ice-President  in  1836,  on  the 
ticket  with  General  Harrison,  became  Postmaster-General  in  the  latter's 
Cabinet,  served  a  number  of  years  in  Congress,  and  twice  ran  for  Gov- 
ernor in  New  York,  where  a  section  of  the  Whig  part}^  for  some  time 
known  as  "  Silver  Grays  "  took  their  name  from  the  color  of  his  hair. 
His  father,  Gideon  Granger,  was  a  Cabinet  minister  under  both  Jefferson 
and  Madison. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  269 

not  alike  in  temperament,  as  Mr.  Wintlirop's  uncertain 
health  often  made  him  despondent,  while  his  wife's 
native  buoyancy  of  disposition  supplied  the  precise 
tonic  he  needed. 

[July  4,  1866.]  When  I  saw  the  President  at  the  White 
House  in  May,  he  impressed  me  more  agreeably  than  ever 
before,  and  however  much  I  may  regret  some  of  the  incidents 
of  his  course,  I  rejoice  he  has  made  a  stand  against  the 
extremists.  Lincoln,  I  believe,  would  have  done  the  same, 
though  with  much  more  tact  and  a  greater  chance  of  success. 
Johnson  is  certainly  an  able  writer,  —  more  so  than  I  had 
given  him  credit  for.  Dean  Milman  says  his  December  mes- 
sage was  equal  to  any  state  paper  of  England's  best  days. 
The  Sumner-Stevens  faction  are,  in  my  judgment,  the  most 
pestilent  fellows  in  the  land,  and  it  is  pleasant  to  see  them 
'  hoist  with  their  own  petard.'  Whatever  may  come  of  the 
Philadelphia  Convention,  it  is  called  in  the  true  spirit.  Good- 
will and  kindness  will  do  more  to  restore  the  Union  than  all 
the  Constitutional  amendments  that  can  be  devised.  I  have 
done  my  best  to  raise  money  to  alleviate  the  individual  cases 
of  distress  you  mention  among  our  friends,  but  I  am  appalled 
by  all  I  hear  of  widespread  suffering  among  Southern  widows 
and  orphans.  I  dare  say  most  of  them  were  flagrant  rebels, 
but  I  cannot  consider  this  a  reason  for  allowing  them  to 
starve.  I  am  afraid  that  I  am  a  poor  hater,  and  should  be 
constrained  to  plead  guilty  to  the  charge  of  having  jparum 
odisse  malos  cives. 

[Sept.  17.]  You  will  have  noticed  that  I  declined  to  head 
the  Massachusetts  delegation  to  Philadelphia,  where  I  had 
some  reason  to  think  the  Chairmanship  of  the  Convention 
awaited  me.  Since  then  Blatchford,  Raymond,  and  Co.  have 
vainly  endeavored  to  impress  me  into  addressing  their  mass 
meeting  in  New  York.  The  truth  is,  such  acceptances  would 
readily  be  construed  as  a  willingness  on  my  part  to  stay  in 
politics,  which  I  really  loathe  more  than  ever.     My  wife  is 


270  A   MEMOIR   OF 

anxious  to  go  abroad  on  a  long  absence,  and  this  seems  a 
favorable  time  to  take  up  the  position  of  '  independent  voter,' 
and  leave  the  field  to  younger  men.  Moreover,  though  I 
heartily  concurred  with  the  general  views  of  those  by  whom 
the  Convention  was  called,  I  have  no  faith  that  I  could  have 
accomplished  any  good  there.  .  .  .  Our  extreme  Radicals  have 
learned  that  they  thrive  best  upon  mischief,  and  they  will  do 
their  utmost  to  keep  the  country  by  the  ears.  There  are, 
however,  some  notable  exceptions.  A  conversation  I  recently 
had  with  John  A.  Andrew  has  led  me  to  augur  well  of  his 
moderation  should  he  succeed  Sumner  in  the  Senate,  which, 
I  hear,  is  talked  of.  He  is  young  enough  to  render  important 
service  there. 

Mr.  Winthrop's  letter  declining  to  be  a  delegate 
to  the  National  Union  Convention  at  Philadelphia  in 
August,  1866,  is  to  be  found  in  full  in  his  second 
volume,  and  closed  as  follows  :  — 

Congress  has  ample  means  of  protecting  itself,  and  of  pro- 
tecting the  country,  from  the  presence  of  disloyal  men  in  the 
halls  of  legislation,  by  the  simple  exercise  of  the  power  which 
each  branch  possesses,  of  deciding  without  appeal  on  the  quali- 
fications of  its  own  members.  Had  the  case  of  each  individual 
Senator  or  Representative  elected  from  the  States  lately  in 
rebellion  been  taken  up  by  itself,  and  fairly  considered  on  its 
own  merits,  agreeably  to  the  wise  suggestions  of  President 
Johnson,  no  one  could  have  complained,  whatever  might  have 
been  the  result.  This  great  question  of  representation,  how- 
ever, is  not  a  question  which  concerns  only  the  Southern 
States,  who,  I  know,  are  regarded  by  not  a  few  unrelenting 
men  as  having  forfeited  all  rights  which  the  Northern  States 
are  bound  to  respect.  It  is  a  question  which  concerns  the 
Constitution  and  the  whole  country.  It  was  to  enforce  and 
vindicate  that  Constitution  that  blood  and  treasure  have 
been  poured  out  so  lavishly  during  the  late  four  years  of  civil 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  271 

war.  "Who  could  have  believed  in  advance  that  a  year  and 
a  half  after  that  war  had  ended,  and  after  the  Union  had 
been  rescued  and  restored  so  far  as  our  gallant  armies  and 
navies  could  accomplish  it,  nearly  one-third  of  the  States 
should  still  be  seen  knocking  in  vain  at  the  doors  of  the 
Capitol,  and  should  be  denied  even  a  hearing  in  the  councils 
of  the  nation  ?  Such  a  course  may,  indeed,  be  calculated  to 
prolong  the  predominance  of  a  party,  but  it  seems  to  me 
utterly  inconsistent  with  the  supremacy  of  the  Constitution. 
I  have  no  disposition,  however,  to  indulge  in  any  imputations 
either  upon  parties  or  upon  individuals.  I  hope  that  a  spirit 
of  forbearance  and  moderation  will  prevail  at  Philadelphia, 
notwithstanding  the  insulting  and  proscrij)tive  tone  in  which 
the  Convention  has  been  assailed  by  so  many  of  the  oppo- 
nents of  the  President  of  the  United  States.  But  I  shall  be 
greatly  disappointed,  I  confess,  if  through  the  influence  of 
that  Convention,  or  through  some  other  influence,  the  people 
of  the  whole  country  are  not  soon  aroused  to  the  danger  of 
allowing  the  Constitution  to  be  longer  the  subject  of  partial 
and  discretionary  observance  on  the  part  of  those  who  are 
sworn  to  support  it.  It  is  vain  to  offer  test  oaths  to  others, 
if  we  fail  to  fulfil  our  own  oaths.  The  necessities  of  a  state 
of  war  may  be  an  excuse  for  many  irregularities,  both  legisla- 
tive and  executive.  But  now  that,  by  the  blessing  of  God, 
a  state  of  peace  has  been  restored  to  us,  we  are  entitled  to  the 
Constitution  and  the  Union  in  all  their  legitimate  authority 
and  extent.  Nothing,  in  my  judgment,  could  be  of  worse 
influence  upon  the  future  career  of  our  country  than  that 
Congress  should  even  seem  to  be  holding  in  abeyance  any 
provisions  of  the  Constitution,  until  they  shall  have  been 
changed  under  duress,  in  order  to  suit  the  opinions,  or  secure 
the  interests,  of  a  predominant  party. 

Many  conservative  men  in  different  parts  of  the 
country  were  sanguine  of  success  at  the  November 
elections  and  deplored  Mr.  Win tbr op's  withdrawal,  as 


272  A  MEMOIR  OF 

is  shown  not  merely  by  private  letters,  but  by  tbe  fol- 
lowing extracts  from  two  newspapers  which  I  have  not 
been  able  to  identify :  — 

"  Mr.  Winthrop's  indisposition  to  attend  the  Convention  at 
Philadelphia  is  much  regretted  by  his  numerous  friends  there 
assembled.  Had  he  been  present,  he  would  undoubtedly 
have  been  chosen  to  preside,  and  after  the  elections  of 
November  have  harmonized  the  country  and  restored  the 
Union,  he  would  have  found  himself  standing  in  a  high  posi- 
tion of  honor  and  usefulness.  Such  an  opportunity  for  im- 
portant and  honorable  service  is  not  often  presented  to  an 
individual,  however  exalted  his  ability  and  attainments,  and 
it  is  a  matter  of  regret,  both  on  his  own  account  and  that  of 
the  nation,  when  an  eminent  citizen  is  unable  to  take  advan- 
tage of  an  opportunity  which  cannot  be  expected  to  occur 
more  than  once  in  a  lifetime." 


"Mr.  Winthrop  has  indorsed  Mr.  Johnson's  Presidency, 
which  is  more  than  Mr.  Johnson  would  do  for  Mr.  Win- 
throp's Speakership.  The  former  used  to  have  a  special 
spite  against  the  eminent  representative  from  Boston,  by  whose 
modes  of  life  his  own  primitive  habits  were  rebuked.  The 
calm  undemonstrative  manners  of  the  polished  Speaker  prob- 
ably struck  him  as  being  of  a  patrician  character,  and  thus 
all  the  '  plebeian '  in  his  nature  was  aroused  and  irritated.  .  .  . 
The  course  of  political  events  has  brought  the  two  men  to- 
gether, as  prominent  members  of  the  same  party,  and  the  Presi- 
dent might  call  his  ablest  and  most  distinguished  supporter 
in  New  England  to  the  State  Department,  should  Mr.  Sew- 
ard carry  into  effect  the  intention  often  attributed  to  him,  of 
retiring  to  the  shades  of  Auburn.  Some  of  the  Southrons 
are  displeased  that  Mr.  Winthrop  did  not  attend  the  Phila- 
delphia Convention,  but  that  is  a  feeling  which  will  pass 
away  like  a  summer's  cloud." 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  273 

If,  on  one  or  two  subsequent  occasions,  Mr.  Win- 
throp's  name  figured  prominently  in  connection  with 
some  political  meeting,  it  was  without  his  knowledge 
and  against  his  will.  If,  in  some  few  subsequent  elec- 
tions, he  was  persuaded  to  declare  his  personal  prefer- 
ences for  a  particular  candidate,  he  made  a  point  of 
doing  so  briefly  and  unobtrusively.  What  may  be 
termed  the  controversial  period  of  his  life  —  a  period 
covering  nearly  a  third  of  a  century  —  ended  with  the 
year  1866,  by  his  own  choice  and  to  his  own  perma- 
nent satisfaction.  Thenceforth  his  time  was  devoted 
to  objects  and  to  institutions,  concerning  which  there 
could  be  but  few  differences  of  opinion,  in  some  of 
which  he  had  long  been  interested,  while  with  others 
—  one,  in  particular  —  he  now  first  became  identified. 
As  sometimes  happens  to  public  men,  it  had  been  his 
good  fortune,  in  the  course  of  his  political  career,  to 
arouse,  by  his  printed  speeches,  an  active  interest  in 
himself  on  the  part  of  persons  residing  at  a  distance 
whom  he  had  never  seen,  or  whose  acquaintance  he 
did  not  make  till  long  afterward.  One  of  these  per- 
sons proved  to  be  George  Peabody,  then  a  banker 
in  London,  afterward  the  famous  philanthropist,  who 
was  accustomed  to  say  that  if  it  were  in  his  power  to 
choose  a  President  of  the  United  States  "that  office 
would  fall  upon  Robert  C.  Winthrop."  The  latter 
would  hardly  have  been  human  if  he  had  not  been 
flattered  by  the  repeated  expression  of  a  preference 
which,  though  not  wholly  unprecedented,  was  certainly 
uncommon ;  and  if  anything  further  had  been  needed  to 
endear  Mr.  Peabody  to  Mr.  Winthrop,  it  would  have 
been  the  gift  by  the  former — by  his  own  volition,  and 

18 


274  A  MEMOIR  OF 

solely  to  gratify  the  latter  —  of  the  sum  of  $20,000  to 
this  Society.  Like  most  men  of  exceptional  wealth, 
Mr.  Peabody  had  a  very  decided  will  of  his  own,  but 
he  was  in  the  habit,  in  the  latter  part  of  his  life,  of 
seeking  Mr.  Winthrop's  advice  upon  a  variety  of  sub- 
jects, more  particularly  his  educational  foundations  in 
this  country,  at  the  head  of  two  of  which  Mr.  Win- 
throp  willingly  consented  to  serve :  the  Peabody  Mu- 
seum of  ArcliEeology  and  Ethnology  at  Cambridge,  and 
the  great  Peabody  Trust  for  Southern  Education,  an 
object  into  which  he  entered  heart  and  soul.  The  win- 
ter of  1867  was  largely  occupied  in  visits  to  Wash- 
ington and  elsewhere,  to  set  on  foot  this  munificent 
undertaking,  but  in  the  ensuing  spring  Mr.  Winthrop 
went  abroad,  returning  home  in  the  autumn  of  1868. 
Some  particulars  of  this,  his  third  visit  to  Europe,  may 
be  found  in  the  "Reminiscences  of  Foreign  Travel," 
already  cited,  as  well  as  in  the  tenth  volume  of  the 
first  series  of  this  Society's  Proceedings,  which  con- 
tains letters  written  by  him  from  abroad  to  our  late 
Vice-President,  Charles  Deane. 

The  later  volumes  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  collected  Ad- 
dresses and  Speeches  contain  nearly  one  hundred  and 
fifty  utterances,  of  greater  or  less  length,  in  various 
places  and  on  various  occasions,  from  1866  to  1886,  to 
say  nothing  of  published  letters  and  other  papers.  I 
have  no  intention  of  specifically  alluding  to  a  tithe  of 
these  productions,  which  include  much  historical  mate- 
rial, together  with  tributes  to  distinguished  men  in  dif- 
ferent countries  with  whom  he  had  been  personally 
associated,  and  to  honored  members  of  this  Society. 
I  shall  refer  only,  and  in  proper  order,  to  those  which 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  275 

attracted  most  attention.  In  January,  1869,  he  de- 
livered at  the  Lowell  Institute  in  Boston  the  first 
of  a  series  of  historical  lectures  upon  Massachusetts 
and  its  Early  History.  In  February,  1870,  he  pro- 
nounced an  elaborate  but  discriminating  eulogy  at  the 
funeral  of  his  friend  George  Peabody,  whose  benefac- 
tions to  the  poor  of  London  had  resulted  in  his  body 
being  brought  across  the  sea  with  almost  royal  honors, 
and  in  his  obsequies  being  attended  by  a  son  of  Queen 
Victoria.  On  the  21st  of  December  of  the  same  year, 
he  w^as  the  orator  of  the  day  at  Plymouth,  at  the  cele- 
bration of  the  two  hundred  and  fiftieth  anniversary 
of  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers.  From  his  ora- 
tion on  this  occasion  —  one  of  the  longest  of  his  com- 
memorative productions  ^  —  I  quote  a  single  passage 
because  it  exhibits  the  general  character  of  his  religious 
views,  which,  to  some  devout  persons  of  his  own  com- 
munion, seemed  almost  as  misguided  as  his  political 
opinions,  —  a  passage  characterized  by  the  "American 
Churchman  "  as  "  pretty,  but  shallow  "  :  — 

1  In  the  "New  Englander  "  for  April,  1871,  is  to  be  found  a  notice- 
able article  entitled  "Winthrop  and  Emerson  on  Forefathers'  Day," 
describing  and  contrasting  Mr.  Winthrop's  oration  at  Plymouth,  and 
that  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  before  the  New  England  Society  of 
New  York.  Of  the  former  it  says,  "  All  are  agreed  that  Mr.  Winthrop 
performed  his  part  in  a  way  truly  noble  and  satisfactory.  Those  who 
were  permitted  to  be  within  the  sound  of  his  voice  in  that  service 
count  it  one  of  the  fortunate  days  of  their  lives.  The  occasion  w^as 
so  grand  in  itself,  and  the  ancestral  associations  came  flocking  back 
upon  him  so,  that  the  orator  was  lifted  out  of  himself  and  borne  up- 
ward into  a  most  commanding  position.  All  his  resources  of  previous 
culture  were  brought  into  the  fullest  and  happiest  play.  It  was  a  feli- 
citous day  for  him  as  well  as  for  those  who  heard  him.  Nothing  he 
has  ever  done  will  be  remembered  to  his  honor  more  surely  and  certainly 
than  this."  His  own  scribbling  diary  contains  the  following  brief  entry  : 
"  Everybody  seemed  pleased,  and,  for  a  wonder,  I  was  almost  satisfied 
with  myself.     Laus  Deo" 


276  A  MEMOIR  OF 

Few  persons,  I  presume,  will  doubt  that  had  the  Church 
of  England,  between  1608  and  1620,  been  what  it  is  to-day, 
and  its  Bishops  and  Archbishops  such  in  life  and  in  spirit  as 
those  who  have  recently  presided  at  London  and  Canterbury, 
Brewster  and  Bradford  would  hardly  have  left  Scrooby,  and 
the  '  Mayflower '  might  long  have  been  employed  in  less  inter- 
esting ways  than  in  bringing  Separatists  to  Plymouth  Rock. 
As  that  church  and  its  prelates  then  were,  let  us  thank  God 
that  such  Separatists  were  found !  An  Episcopalian  myself, 
by  election  as  well  as  by  education,  and  warmly  attached  to 
the  forms  and  the  faith  in  which  I  was  brought  up ;  believ- 
ing that  the  Church  of  England  has  rendered  inestimable 
service  to  the  cause  of  religion  in  furnishing  a  safe  and  sure 
anchorage  in  so  many  stormy  times,  when  the  minds  of  men 
were  'tossed  to  and  fro  and  carried  about  with  every  wind  of 
doctrine ;  *  and  prizing  the  Prayer-Book  as  second  only  to  the 
Bible  in  the  richness  of  its  treasures  of  prayer  and  praise,  — • 
I  yet  rejoice  as  heartily  as  any  Congregationalist  who  listens 
to  me,  that  our  Pilgrim  Fathers  were  Separatists.  I  rejoice, 
too,  that  the  Puritan  Fathers  of  Massachusetts,  who  followed 
them  to  these  shores  ten  years  afterward,  though,  to  the 
last,  they  'esteemed  it  their  honor  to  call  the  Church  of 
England  their  dear  mother,  and  could  not  part  from  their 
native  country  where  she  specially  resideth,  without  much 
sadness  of  heart  and  many  tears,'  were,  if  not  technically 
and  professedly,  yet  to  all  intents  and  purposes.  Separatists 
also.  I  rejoice  that  the  prelatical  assumptions  and  tyrannies 
of  that  day  were  resisted.  The  Church  of  England  would 
never  have  been  the  noble  church  it  has  since  become,  had 
there  been  no  seasonable  protest  against  its  corruptions,  its 
extravagant  formalism,  and  its  overbearing  intolerance.  .  .  . 

Let  those  who  will,  indulge  in  the  dream,  or  cherish  the 
waking  vision,  of  a  single  universal  Church  on  earth,  recog- 
nized and  accepted  of  men,  whose  authority  is  binding  on 
every  conscience,  and  decisive  of  every  point  of  faith  or  form. 
To  the  eye  of  God,  indeed,  such  a  church  may  be  visible 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  277 

even  now,  in  '  the  blessed  company  of  all  faithful  people,'  in 
whatever  region  they  may  dwell,  with  whatever  organization 
they  may  be  connected,  with  Him  as  their  head  '  of  whom  the 
whole  family  in  earth  and  heaven  is  named.'  And  as,  in  some 
grand  orchestra,  hundreds  of  performers,  each  with  his  own 
instrument  and  his  own  separate  score,  strike  widely  variant 
notes,  and  produce  sounds,  sometimes  in  close  succession  and 
sometimes  at  lengthened  intervals,  which  heard  alone  would 
seem  to  be  wanting  in  everything  like  method  or  melody,  but 
which  heard  together  are  found  delighting  the  ear,  and  rav- 
ishing the  soul,  with  a  flood  of  magnificent  harmony,  as  they 
give  concerted  expression  to  the  glowing  conceptions  of  some 
mighty  master,  —  even  so,  it  may  be,  from  the  differing, 
broken,  and  often  seemingly  discordant  strains  of  sincere 
seekers  after  God,  the  Divine  ear,  upon  which  no  lisp  of  the 
voice  or  breathing  of  the  heart  is  lost,  catches  only  a  com- 
bined and  glorious  anthem  of  prayer  and  praise.  But  to 
human  ears  such  harmonies  are  not  vouchsafed.  The  Church, 
in  all  its  majestic  unity,  shall  be  revealed  hereafter.  The 
'  Jerusalem  which  is  the  mother  of  us  all,  is  above ; '  and  we 
can  only  hope  that,  in  the  providence  of  God,  its  gates  shall 
be  wider,  and  its  courts  fuller,  and  its  members  quickened 
and  multiplied,  by  the  very  differences  of  form  and  of  doc- 
trine which  have  divided  Christians  from  each  other  on  earth, 
and  which  have  created  something  of  competition  and  rivalry, 
and  even  of  contention,  in  their  efforts  to  advance  the  ends  of 
their  respective  denominations.  Absolute  religious  uniform- 
ity, as  poor  human  nature  is  now  constituted,  would  but  too 
certainly  be  the  cause,  if  it  were  not  itself  the  consequence, 
of  absolute  religious  indifference  and  stagnation. 

In  August,  1871,  be  and  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  were 
the  principal  speakers  at  a  celebration  by  this  Society  of 
the  centennial  anniversary  of  the  birthday  of  Walter 
Scott,  and  in  the  following  summer  he  had  a  slight 
temporary  relapse  into  politics.    During  the  Presidential 


278  A  MEMOIR  OF 

canvass  of  1868  he  had  been  absent  from  home,  but  as 
the  contest  of  1872  approached  he  was  one  of  those 
who  hoped  that  Charles  Francis  Adams  might  head  the 
opposition  to  the  re-election  of  General  Grant,  as  can- 
didate of  the  combined  Democracy  and  "  Liberal  Re- 
publicans." This  candidacy,  however,  was  secured  by 
Horace  Greeley,  whom  Mr.  Winthrop  considered  a 
remarkable  man  in  his  way,  but  a  thoroughly  unsafe 
politician,  to  whose  kite  was  appended  an  even  more 
objectionable  tail,  in  the  person  of  Gratz  Brown  of 
Missouri.  He  accordingly  decided,  as  a  choice  of  evils, 
to  vote  for  Grant,  of  whom  he  had  latterly  seen  a  good 
deal  in  connection  with  the  Peabody  Trust,  and  for 
whom  he  had  a  personal  liking.  When  this  intention 
became  bruited,  he  was  urged  to  make  a  speech,  or  at 
least  some  public  declaration  of  his  views,  which  he 
declined  to  do,  but  consented  to  have  published  the 
following  passage  in  a  letter  to  Governor  Clifford : 

[Aug.  8,  1872.]  When  I  accepted  the  chairmanship  of  the 
Southern  Education  Trustees,  I  resolved  to  keep  out  of  poli- 
tics. If  Mr.  Adams  had  been  nominated,  I  should  have  been 
seriously  tempted  to  reconsider  my  resolution.  As  it  is,  I 
shall  adhere  to  it  firmly,  except  so  far  as  giving  my  vote  to 
General  Grant.  You  and  I  will  thus  vote  alike  again,  as  we 
did  in  good  old  Whig  times,  and  as  we  have  not  always  done 
since.  I  certainly  cannot  support  Greeley  and  the  Coalition. 
I  can  see  no  safety  for  the  country  in  their  success.  Neither 
reform  nor  reconciliation  could  result  from  so  unnatural  a 
combination,  but  only  renewed  discord  and  confusion. 

His  intention  for  the  first  time  to  vote  the  Republi- 
can ticket  in  a  general  election  excited  a  good  deal  of 
remark ;  but  the  Greeley  press  ingeniously  endeavored 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  279 

to  ascribe  a  personal  motive  to  it,  and  gave  wide  circu- 
lation to  the  following  squib  :  — 

"Robert  C.  Winthrop  cannot  bear  to  be  on  the  same  side 
with  Charles  Sumner,  and  so  has  come  out  for  Grant." 

[Brookline,  Aug.  16,  1872.]  I  send  you  a  slip  from  a 
Charleston  paper,  received  yesterday  from  one  of  my  South 
Carolina  cousins.  Was  there  ever  greater  rascality  than 
seems  to  have  been  practised  there?  Can  any  one  wonder 
that  our  friend  Aiken  and  all  the  rest  are  ready  for  any  change  ? 
Yet  I  do  not  see  how  Grant  and  his  Administration  are  in- 
volved in  the  responsibility.  It  is  the  first  fruit,  I  presume, 
of  unrestricted  suffrage,  black  and  white,  which  brought  into 
office  incompetent  and  unprincipled  men.  And  for  this,  cer- 
tainly, Sumner  and  Greeley  are  quite  as  much  responsible 
as  anybody  else.  Indeed,  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  their 
departure  from  among  the  supporters  of  the  Administration 
may  fairly  be  considered  a  not  inconsiderable  step  towards  its 
purification.  I  am  not,  however,  disposed  to  join  in  the  hue 
and  cry  against  Sumner  just  now,  because  I  think  the  violence 
of  his  philippic  against  Grant  has  defeated  its  purpose. 
Vituperation  has  become  a  second  nature  to  him,  if  it  were 
not  original  depravity,  and  we  must  all  make  allowance  for  a 
temperament  which  he  may  have  been  unable  to  resist.  He 
sometimes  reminds  me  of  Pope's  lines :  — 

*  Railing  and  praising  were  his  usual  themes, 
And  both  (to  show  his  judgment)  in  extremes. 
So  over-violent,  or  over-civil. 
That  every  man  with  him  was  God  or  Devil.' 

The  canvass,  thus  far,  strikes  me  as  the  most  disgusting  one 
in  American  history.  Greeley  travels  about  in  his  white  coat, 
like  the  Candidate  in  the  worst  of  old  Roman  days,  soliciting 
votes  for  himself  and  playing  humble  to  the  multitude,  in  a 
style  never  before  exhibited  by  a  Presidential  aspirant.  It  is 
loathsome  beyond  expression  to  any  one  who  respects  or  loves 
his  country. 


280  A  MEMOIR   OF 

[Aug.  21.]  A  report  has  reached  me  that  there  is  a  purpose 
in  some  quarters  to  put  my  name  on  the  Grant  electoral  ticket. 
I  cannot  think  such  an  idea  can  be  seriously  entertained,  but  it 
is  quite  out  of  the  question.  As  between  Grant  and  Greeley, 
I  go  for  Grant,  and  that  heartily,  but  it  must  be  clearly  under- 
stood that  I  do  so  as  an  Independent  Conservative  voter.  .  .  . 
I  see  in  a  New  York  paper  that  '  a  scholar  of  established  repu- 
tation and  high  moral  character '  has  written  from  Cambridge 
to  '  one  of  the  most  distinguished  men  of  the  country '  charg- 
ing that  Grant  was  so  drunk  at  Commencement  '  as  to  excite 
a  general  feeling  of  anxiety  and  disgust.'  It  would  be  curious 
to  ascertain  the  name  of  this  scholar  of  established  reputation 
and  high  moral  character.  You  and  Grant  were  more  fortu- 
nate than  I,  if  you  got  anything  stronger  than  water  at  the 
Commencement  dinner.  The  author  of  this  shameful  libel 
must  have  mistaken  Gratz  Brown  at  Yale  for  Grant  at 
Harvard ! 

[Sept.  2.]  Who  do  you  think  called  here  lately  ?  Sumner 
himself,  —  a  rare  shadow  on  my  threshold.  He  was  very  agree- 
able, as  he  always  can  be  when  he  chooses,  but  we  eschewed 
politics,  though,  but  for  the  presence  of  another  visitor,  I 
should  have  enjoyed  an  interchange  of  views.  .  .  .  The  Fe- 
male Suffrage  Resolution  at  the  Republican  Convention  was 
ridiculous,  and  our  friend  Wilson  is  making  a  bad  figure  on 
the  Know-Nothing  business.  But  I  shut  my  eyes  to  every- 
thing but  the  humiliation  of  having  Greeley  for  President, 
and  I  rejoice  that  such  a  prospect  is  growing  '  small  by  de- 
grees, and  beautifully  less.' 

[Oct.  29.]  I  earnestly  hope,  as  you  do,  that  the  triumph 
which  will  be  achieved  next  week  will  embolden  the  Presi- 
dent to  bring  some  men  around  him  for  the  next  four  years, 
in  whom  we  shall  all  have  confidence,  and  if  you  should  prove 
to  be  one  of  them,  it  would  give  me  a  great  deal  of  pleasure. 
I  greatly  fear,  however,  that  the  Butler-Loring  interest  will 
prevail  in  Massachusetts,  and  that  nothing  will  be  suffered 
to  interfere  with  their  prospects.     Be  this  as  it  may,  I,  for 


EGBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  281 

one,  have  no  disposition  to  re-enter  tlie  political  circle.  Be- 
sides your  kind  suggestion,  Wilson  has  been  dropping  hints 
about  my  consenting  to  let  my  name  be  considered  for  a 
foreign  mission,  intimating  that  Grant  would  be  entirely 
willing  to  make  such  an  appointment  if  he  (Wilson)  could 
get  it  through  the  Senate,  which  he  thinks  he  can,  et  cetera. 
I  positively  refused.  I  do  not  wish  to  be  drawn  into  the 
position  of  indorsing  the  Republican  party,  nor  would  any- 
thing of  the  sort  tempt  me  nowadays.  If  I  go  abroad  again, 
as  I  dare  say  I  shall,  I  prefer  that  it  should  be  in  the  quiet 
way  I  have  several  times  gone  before.  I  have  gradually 
accumulated  so  many  friends  in  foreign  countries  that  things 
are  made  very  pleasant  for  me  out  there,  and  I  should  not 
fancy  being  tethered  to  a  round  of  official  duties.  Wilson's 
obvious  object  is  to  strengthen  Grant's  second  administration 
in  the  public  mind,  but  I  think  he  means  kindly  by  me  and 
I  am  not  insensible  to  his  soft  speeches.  No  man  did  as 
much  as  he  to  arrest  my  Senatorial  career  twenty-two  years 
ago,  and  we  have  exchanged  some  hard  knocks  since ;  but 
in  spite  of  all  this  I  have  acquired  a  sort  of  liking  for 
him.  It  is  certainly  remarkable  that  he  should  have  at- 
tained the  position  he  has  without  the  slightest  early  ad- 
vantages. I  hope  you  managed  to  hear  some  of  Tyndall's 
delightful  lectures.  He  came  out  here  to  lunch  and  I  had 
Agassiz  to  meet  him.  I  found  him  an  intelligent  and  agree- 
able fellow,  and  I  am  not  without  hope  he  may  one  day 
change  his  notions  about  religion. 

In  February,  1873,  at  the  dedication  of  the  new 
Town  Hall  at  Brookline,  he  delivered  by  request  an 
address  of  considerable  length  and  much  local  interest 
upon  the  Environs  of  Boston.  In  March  he  spoke  in 
honor  of  his  predecessor  in  the  Presidency  of  this  Soci- 
ety, his  friend  and  his  father's  friend,  James  Savage. 
A   little    later   in   the   same    year,   he   unsuccessfully 


282  A  MEMOIR   OF 

endeavored  to  procure  the  election  of  his  friend,  Alex- 
ander H.  Vinton,  to  the  vacant  bishopric  of  Massachu- 
setts, contributing  to  the  literature  of  that  contest  a 
noticeable  letter,  signed  "  W."  in  the  "  Daily  Advertiser  " 
of  March  13,  1873.  Besides  serving  on  the  Standing 
Committee  of  the  diocese  and  as  Chairman  of  its  "  Trus- 
tees of  Donations,"  he  had  been  actively  connected  with 
the  Episcopal  Theological  School  at  Cambridge,  from 
its  foundation  in  1867.  In  the  spring  of  1873,  a 
wealthy  layman  offered  the  much-needed  addition  of 
$100,000  to  the  funds  of  that  institution  on  condition 
that  it  should  thenceforth  be  controlled  by  High 
Churchmen.  The  published  answer  of  the  board  of 
government,  declining  this  proposal,  was  written  by 
Mr.  Winthrop,  and  it  was  one  upon  the  tone  and  argu- 
ments of  which  he  somewhat  prided  himself.-^  In  De- 
cember of  the  same  year  he  spoke  in  Faneuil  Hall  at 
the  centennial  celebration  of  the  "Boston  Tea-party," 
and  on  the  12th  of  March,  1874,  it  became  his  official 
duty  to  announce  in  fitting  terms  to  this  Society  at  its 
monthly  meeting  the  loss  of  one  of  its  honorary  mem- 
bers, Millard  Fillmore,  and  of  one  of  its  nominally  resi- 
dent-members, Charles  Sumner,  whose  death  he  had 
only  learned  the  same  morning. 

It  is  [said  he]  an  event  too  solemn  and  too  impressive  to 
be  the  subject  of  any  off-hand  utterances.  Yet,  assembled 
here  as  we  are  to-day,  with  so  striking  an  event  uppermost 
in  all  our  thoughts,  it  cannot  be  passed  over  in  silence,  cer- 
tainly not  by  me.  To  us,  as  a  society,  Mr.  Sumner  was, 
indeed,  but  little,  his  name  having  been  added  to  our  resi- 

^  A  Statement  by  the  Trustees  of  the  Episcopal  Theological  School, 
Cambridge,  Mass.     John  Wilson  and  Son,  1873. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  283 

dent-roll  only  within  a  few  months  past,  and  it  never  having 
been  convenient  to  him  to  be  present  at  even  one  of  our 
meetings.  We  had  all  sincerely  hoped,  however,  that  in 
some  future  interval  between  the  sessions  of  Congress,  in 
some  breathing-time  from  his  arduous  and  assiduous  public 
labors,  we  might  have  enjoyed  the  benefit  of  his  large 
acquaintance  with  historical  subjects,  and  of  the  rich  accom- 
plishments by  which  he  was  distinguished.  That  hope  is 
now  suddenly  brought  to  an  end,  and  we  have  only  the  sat- 
isfaction of  knowing  that  his  election,  as  one  of  our  restricted 
number,  afforded  him  a  moment's  gratification  in  what  have 
so  unexpectedly  proved  to  be  the  last  few  months  of  his  life. 

In  the  Senate  of  the  United  States,  in  which  for  more  than 
three  terms  he  has  been  so  prominent  and  conspicuous  a 
member,  the  gap  created  by  his  death  cannot  easily  be 
measured.  There,  for  so  many  years,  he  has  been  one  of 
the  observed  of  all  observers.  There,  for  so  many  years, 
scarce  a  word  or  an  act  of  his  has  failed  to  be  the  subject 
of  widespread  attention  and  comment.  No  name  has  been 
oftener  in  the  columns  of  the  daily  press,  or  on  the  lips  of 
the  people  in  all  parts  of  the  country,  —  sometimes  for  criti- 
cism, and  even  for  censure,  but  far  more  generally  for  com- 
mendation and  applause.  Such  a  name,  certainly,  cannot 
pass  from  the  rolls  of  living  men  without  leaving  a  large 
void  to  many  eyes  and  to  many  hearts. 

One  of  the  pioneers  in  the  cause  of  antislavery,  while  yet 
in  private  life,  he  breasted  the  billows  of  that  raging  contro- 
versy with  unsparing  energy,  until  the  struggle  ceased  with 
the  institution  which  had  given  rise  to  it.  The  same  untir- 
ing energy  was  then  transferred  to  what  he  regarded  as  the 
rights  of  the  race  which  had  been  emancipated.  Indeed, 
everything  which  could  be  associated  with  the  idea  of  human 
rights  was  made  the  subject  of  his  ardent  advocacy,  accord- 
ing to  his  own  judgment  and  convictions.  Devoting  himself 
early,  also,  to  the  cause  of  peace,  and  making  the  relations 
of  the  United  States  with  other  nations  a  matter  for  special 


284  A  MEMOIR   OF 

study,  his  unwearied  labors  as  Chairman  of  the  Committee 
of  Foreign  Affairs  for  several  years,  and  his  acknowledged 
familiarity  with  international  law,  can  never  be  undervalued 
or  forgotten. 

As  a  writer,  a  lecturer,  a  debater,  and  an  orator,  he  had 
acquired  the  strongest  hold  on  public  attention  everywhere, 
both  at  home  and  abroad ;  and  few  scholars  have  brought  to 
the  illustration  of  their  topics,  whether  political  or  literary, 
the  fruits  of  greater  research.  His  orations  and  speeches,  of 
which  a  new  edition,  revised  by  his  own  hand,  is  understood 
to  be  approaching  a  completion,  cannot  fail  to  be  a  rich  store- 
house of  classical  and  historical  lore,  and  will  certainly  fur- 
nish a  most  valuable  series  of  pictures,  from  his  own  point 
of  view,  of  the  stirring  scenes  to  which  they  relate. 

The  tidings  of  his  death  have  come  upon  us  with  too 
painful  a  surprise  to  allow  of  our  dwelling  at  length  on  his 
crowded  and  eventful  public  career.  For  myself,  I  need 
hardly  say  that  any  detailed  discussion  of  his  course  might 
involve  peculiar  elements  of  delicacy  and  difficulty ;  as  it  has 
been  my  fortune,  or  as  others  may  think,  my  misfortune,  to 
differ  from  him  so  often  and  so  widely,  —  sometimes  as  to 
conclusions  and  ends,  but  far  more  frequently  as  to  the  means 
of  reaching  those  conclusions  and  of  advancing  those  ends. 
I  am  glad  to  remember,  however,  that  everything  of  persona] 
alienation  and  estrangement  had  long  ago  ceased  between  us, 
and  that  no  one  has  been  more  ready  than  myself,  for  many 
years  past,  to  welcome  him  into  this  Society.  His  praises 
will  be  abundantly  and  far  more  fitly  spoken  elsewhere,  by 
some  of  the  friends  to  whom  he  was  so  dear,  and  you  will  all 
pardon  me,  I  know,  if  the  suddenness  of  the  announcement 
has  prevented  me  from  paying  a  more  adequate  tribute  to 
his  culture,  his  accomplishments,  his  virtues,  and  to  those 
commanding  qualities  by  which  he  impressed  himself  on  the 
period  in  which  he  lived. 

These  remarks  appeared  in  a  Boston  paper  of  the 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  285 

same  evening,  and  the  next  morning  he  received  the 
following  note :  — 

Amesbury,  12  3"?o,  1874. 

My  dear  Friend,  —  As  a  lifelong  friend  of  Charles  Sum- 
ner, I  cannot  resist  the  desire  to  thank  thee  for  thy  generous 
and  beautiful  tribute  to  his  memory  before  the  Historical 
Society.  I  have  read  it  with  more  satisfaction  than  any 
other  notice  of  the  sad  event. 

I  may  mention  here  that  when  I  expressed  to  Mr.  S.  my 
regret  that  he  had  used  some  expressions  in  a  letter  to  thee 
wliich  I  thought  unwarranted,  he  assured  me  that  he  had  the 
highest  personal  respect  for  thee,  and  only  dissented  from 
thy  views  on  the  question  at  issue.  Believe  me  very  truly, 
Always  thy  friend, 

John  G.  Whittier. 

Robert  C.  Winthrop. 

A  few  days  later  a  friend  showed  him  a  private  letter 
from  our  late  associate,  Peleg  W.  Chandler,  containing 
the  following  passage  :  — 

[March  15,  1874.]  "  It  strikes  me  that  of  all  the  eulogies 
that  have  been  pronounced  upon  Sumner,  the  remarks  of 
Winthrop  are  quite  superior.  For  dignity,  manliness,  and  a 
certain  simplicity,  they  are  very  marked.  I  well  remember 
the  time  when  there  was  great  personal  bitterness  between 
them,  and,  though  an  intimate  friend  of  Sumner,  I  thought 
that  Winthrop  had  just  cause  for  resentment.  I  was  then  on 
very  intimate  terms  with  Sumner,  seeing  him  every  day,  but 
in  the  attempt  to  defeat  Winthrop's  re-election  to  Congress, 
I  did  all  I  could  in  behalf  of  the  latter,  although  I  hardly 
knew  him  personally.  This  contested  election  broke  up  a 
great  harmony  that  had  existed  among  the  denizens  of  No.  4 
Court  Street,  although  my  own  personal  relations  with  Sum- 
ner have  always  been  pleasant.  There  are  certain  parts  of 
his  character  which  I  think  I  knew  as  well  as  any  man  liv- 


286  A  MEMOIR   OF 

ing.  He  was  a  hard  opponent,  unsparing  and  even  cruel. 
Knowing  what  I  do  know,  it  struck  me  that  Winthrop's 
brief  mention  of  the  dead  Senator  was  very  fine.  It  revealed 
to  me  an  elevated  plane  in  his  own  character,  of  which  I  was 
not  before  aware.  There  is  one  thing  that  must  be  said  of 
Winthrop  as  well  as  of  Sumner.  The  latter,  I  know,  was 
very  sensitive  to  the  criticisms  of  the  newspapers,  and  even 
to  the  stabs  that  were  evidently  malicious  and  false.  The 
same  is  true,  I  fancy,  in  regard  to  the  former;  but  I  never 
could  see  that  either  of  them  swerved  a  hair's  breadth  from 
what  they  conceived  to  be  right,  on  account  of  such 
criticisms.'' 

[March  17.]  I  had  [wrote  Mr.  Winthrop]  so  little  time  to 
think  over  what  it  would  be  fitting  to  me  to  say  of  Sumner 
that  I  had  some  misgivings  as  to  the  effect  I  should  produce. 
My  views  of  his  political  course  are  so  well  known  that  I  did 
not  wish  to  appear  insincere  by  praising  him  too  much,  nor, 
on  the  other  hand,  to  have  it  said  that  our  old  antagonism 
had  resulted  in  my  saying  too  little.  I  seem  to  have  hit  a 
golden  mean,  as  I  have  had  cordial  letters  of  thanks  from 
Whittier  and  other  friends  of  his,  while  the  newspapers  have 
been  very  complimentary,  particularly  the  New  York  'Tri- 
bune '  of  yesterday,  a  quarter  in  which,  as  you  know,  I  am 
not  accustomed  to  look  for  commendation.  At  the  Faneuil 
Hall  meeting,  Joshua  B.  Smith,  the  colored  caterer,  paid  a 
touching  tribute  to  Sumner  which  was  really  the  gem  of  the 
occasion.  As  I  sat,  by  invitation,  on  the  platform,  wedged 
in  between  William  Lloyd  Garrison  and  Henry  Wilson,  a 
certain  sense  of  the  ludicrous  came  over  me,  —  we  seemed 
such  a  queer  trio.  In  the  conversation  we  had  together,  before 
the  exercises  began,  my  distinguished  neighbors  were  by  no 
means  indisposed  to  qualify  their  admiration  of  the  departed, 
but  as  I  was  yesterday  one  of  his  pall-bearers,  I  think  it 
hardly  becoming  to  repeat  what  was  said. 

[March  29.]  I  sometimes  question  whether  the  cause  of 
religion  is  advanced  when   clergymen,  from  a  pulpit   on  a 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP  287 

Sunday,  single  out  for  especial  admiration  statesmen  in  no 
way  identified  with  religious  observances ;  and  I  have  been 
led  into  this  train  of  thought  by  the  fact  that  my  own  rector, 
in  the  course  of  a  fine  sermon  this  morning,  took  occasion  to 
pay  a  brief  but  glowing  tribute  to  Sumner,  who,  according  to 
Henry  Wilson,  had  not  been  inside  of  a  church  for  twelve 
years  past,  unless  to  attend  a  wedding  or  a  funeral.  He 
spoke  of  liim,  moreover,  as  one  who  was  '  a  friend  to  freedom 
when  others  were  its  enemies,'  and  as  'hating  slavery  when 
others  loved  it.'  Precisely  what  was  meant  by  this  allusion 
to  '  others  '  is  not  quite  clear,  but  it  was  interpreted  by  some 
of  the  congregation  as  referring  to  the  party  with  which 
Sumner  was  originally  associated.  If  so,  I  do  not  think  it 
fair.  The  great  Whig  party  loved  freedom  and  hated  slavery 
as  much  as  he,  though  they  could  not  adopt  his  mode  of 
showing  their  love  and  hate.  It  is  a  perversion  of  historic 
cal  truth  to  stigmatize  that  party  as  having  been,  in  any 
sense,  a  proslavery  party.  Even  the  great  leader  of  the 
Southern  Whigs,  Henry  Clay,  can  never  be  so  designated 
without  the  most  reckless  disregard  of  his  career  and  char- 
acter. We  did  what  we  could  to  keep  the  peace  between 
North  and  South,  hoping  that  a  day  would  one  day  be  opened, 
in  the  good  providence  of  God,  for  gradual  emancipation  on 
some  basis  which  would  be  safe  for  both  blacks  and  whites. 
Emancipation  came  as  a  necessity  of  the  Civil  War  which 
we  had  sought  to  avert.  Perhaps  it  could  have  come  in  no 
other  way,  but  we  had  always  looked  to  the  ultimate  disap- 
pearance of  slavery  under  the  influences  of  civilization  and 
Christianity,  without  endangering  the  Union  or  sacrificing 
half  a  million  of  lives.  No  one  will  deny  or  doubt,  I  think, 
that  if  domestic  slavery  could  have  been  extinguished  in  the 
United  States  by  a  great  voluntary  act  of  emancipation  and 
philanthropy,  it  would  have  had  a  grandeur  and  a  glory 
which  can  never  attach  to  its  forcible  extinction  as  an  act 
of  war. 


288  A  MEMOIR   OF 

Early  in  May  Mr.  Winthrop  went  to  Europe,  intend- 
ing to  return  before  the  end  of  the  year ;  but  the  health 
of  two  members  of  his  family  rendered  this  undesirable, 
and  he  did  not  reach  home  until  the  autumn  of  1875. 
Among  the  pleasant  incidents  of  this,  his  fourth  sojourn 
in  foreign  countries,  was  the  bestowal  upon  him  of  the 
degree  of  doctor  of  laws  at  the  Cambridge  Commence- 
ment of  June,  1874,  —  a  degree  many  years  before 
awarded  him  by  various  institutions  of  learning,  but 
which  he  was  gratified  now  to  receive  from  a  famous 
English  University,  with  which,  in  the  remote  past, 
some  members  of  his  family  had  been  associated.^ 
His  stay  abroad  resulted  in  his  being  obliged  to  decline 
an  invitation  from  the  town  of  Lexington  to  deliver 
the  oration  at  its  centennial  celebration  of  the  19th  of 
April,  1775,  and  an  invitation  from  the  Bunker  Hill 
Monument  Association  to  perform  a  similar  duty  at 
the  centennial  celebration  of  the  battle  of  Bunker 
Hill.  He  was  able  to  accept,  however,  an  invitation 
from  the  city  of  Boston  to  be  the  orator  of  the  day 
at  its  centennial  celebration  of  the  Declaration  of  In- 
dependence, July  4,  1876.^  This  occasion  gave  rise  to  a 
formidable  array  of  patriotic  addresses  throughout  the 
country ;  and  an  examination  of  the  leading  newspapers 
of  that  period  shows  that  what  were  considered  the 
three  principal  ones  were  those  delivered  by  William 

1  His  third  volume  of  Addresses  contains  the  remarks  made  by  him 
at  the  Vice-Chancellor's  banquet  on  this  occasion,  and  in  the  thirteenth 
volume  of  the  first  series  of  this  Society's  Proceedings  will  be  found  a 
number  of  letters,  or  parts  of  letters,  written  by  him  during  this  absence 
to  his  friend  Charles  Deane. 

2  It  happened  that,  although  repeatedly  invited,  he  had  never  before 
delivered  a  "  Fourth  of  July  oration,"  but  he  had  always  said  that,  if 
alive  and  well  in  1876,  he  should  be  glad  to  do  so  in  Boston. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  289 

M.  Evarts  in  Philadelphia,  by  Charles  Francis  Adams 
in  Taunton,  and  by  Mr.  Winthrop  in  Boston.  Setting 
aside  any  notices  which  might  be  thought  to  have  been 
in  some  degree  due  to  local  pride  or  personal  friendship, 
the  popular  verdict  would  appear  to  have  been  that  the 
last-named  production,  though  the  longest,  excelled  the 
others  in  a  certain  breeziness,  so  to  speak,  and  in  the 
sustained  interest  imparted  to  a  hackneyed  subject.  I 
quote  only  a  few  closing  paragraphs :  — 

Our  fathers  were  no  propagandists  of  republican  institu- 
tions in  the  abstract.  Their  o^vn  adoption  of  the  republican 
form  was,  at  the  moment,  almost  as  much  a  matter  of  chance 
as  of  choice,  of  necessity  as  of  preference.  The  Thirteen 
Colonies  had,  happily,  been  too  long  accustomed  to  manage 
their  own  affairs,  and  were  too  wisely  jealous  of  each  other, 
also,  to  admit  for  an  instant  any  idea  of  centralization ;  and 
without  centralization  a  monarchy,  or  any  other  form  of  arbi- 
trary government,  was  out  of  the  question.  Union  was  then, 
as  it  is  now,  the  only  safety  for  liberty ;  but  it  could  be  only  a 
Constitutional  Union,  a  limited  and  restricted  Union,  founded 
on  compromises  and  mutual  concessions ;  a  Union  recognizing 
a  large  measure  of  State  rights,  —  resting  not  only  on  the 
division  of  powers  among  legislative  and  executive  depart- 
ments, but  resting  also  on  the  distribution  of  powers  between 
the  States  and  the  Nation,  both  deriving  their  original  authority 
from  the  people,  and  exercising  that  authority  for  the  people. 
This  was  the  system  contemplated  by  the  Declaration  of  1776. 
This  was  the  system  approximated  to  by  the  Confederation  of 
1778-81.  This  was  the  system  finally  consummated  by  the 
Constitution  of  1787.  And  under  this  system  our  great  ex- 
ample of  self-government  has  been  held  up  before  the  nations, 
fulfilling,  so  far  as  it  has  fulfilled  it,  that  lofty  mission  which 
is  recognized  to-day  as  « Liberty  enlightening  the  World.' 
Let  me  not  speak  of  that  example  in  any  vainglorious  spirit. 

19 


290  A   MEMOIR   OF 

Let  me  not  seem  to  arrogate  for  my  country  anything  of  supe- 
rior wisdom  or  virtue.  Who  will  pretend  that  we  have  always 
made  the  most  of  our  independence,  or  the  best  of  our  liberty  ? 
Who  will  maintain  that  we  have  always  exhibited  the  brightest 
side  of  our  institutions,  or  always  intrusted  their  administra- 
tion to  the  wisest  or  worthiest  men  ?  W^ho  will  deny  that  we 
have  sometimes  taught  the  world  what  to  avoid,  as  well  as 
what  to  imitate  ;  and  that  the  cause  of  freedom  and  reform 
has  sometimes  been  discouraged  and  put  back  by  our  short- 
comings, or  by  our  excesses  ?  Our  Light  has  been,  at  best, 
but  a  Revolving  Light ;  warning  by  its  darker  intervals  or  its 
sombre  shades,  as  well  as  cheering  by  its  flashes  of  brilliancy, 
or  by  the  clear  lustre  of  its  steadier  shining.  Yet,  in  spite  of 
all  its  imperfections  and  irregularities,  to  no  other  earthly  light 
have  so  many  eyes  been  turned ;  from  no  other  earthly  illu- 
mination have  so  many  hearts  drawn  hope  and  courage.  It 
has  breasted  the  tides  of  sectional  and  of  party  strife.  It  has 
stood  the  shock  of  foreign  and  of  civil  war.  It  will  still  hold 
on,  erect  and  unextinguished,  defying  the  '  returning  wave ' 
of  demoralization  and  corruption.  Millions  of  young  hearts, 
in  all  quarters  of  our  land,  are  awaking  at  this  moment  to  the 
responsibility  which  rests  peculiarly  upon  them,  for  rendering 
its  radiance  purer  and  brighter  and  more  constant.  Millions 
of  young  hearts  are  resolving,  at  this  hour,  that  it  shall  not  be 
their  fault  if  it  do  not  stand  for  a  century  to  come,  as  it  has 
stood  for  a  century  past,  a  Beacon  of  Liberty  to  mankind !  .  .  . 

We  come  then,  to-day,  with  hearts  full  of  gratitude  to  God 
and  man,  to  pass  down  our  country  and  its  institutions, — 
not  wholly  without  scars  and  blemishes  upon  their  front,  —  not 
without  shadows  on  the  past  or  clouds  on  the  future,  —  but 
freed  forever  from  at  least  one  great  stain,  and  firmly  rooted  in 
the  love  and  loyalty  of  a  United  People,  —  to  the  generations 
which  are  to  succeed  us.  And  what  shall  we  say  to  those 
succeeding  generations,  as  we  commit  the  sacred  trust  to  their 
keeping  and  guardianship  ? 

If  I  could  hope,  without  presumption,  that  any  humble 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  291 

counsels  of  mine,  on  this  hallowed  anniversary,  could  be 
remembered  beyond  the  hour  of  their  utterance,  and  reach 
the  ears  of  my  countrymen  in  future  days  ;  if  I  could  borrow 
'  the  masterly  pen '  of  Jefferson,  and  produce  words  which 
should  partake  of  the  immortality  of  those  which  he  wrote 
on  this  little  desk ;  ^  if  I  could  command  the  matchless  tongue 
of  John  Adams,  when  he  poured  out  aj)peals  and  arguments 
which  moved  men  from  their  seats,  and  settled  the  destinies 
of  a  nation ;  if  I  could  catch  but  a  single  spark  of  those  elec- 
tric fires  which  Franklin  wrested  from  the  skies,  and  flash 
down  a  phrase,  a  word,  a  thought,  along  the  magic  chords 
which  stretch  across  the  ocean  of  the  future,  —  what  could  I, 
what  would  I,  say  ? 

I  could  not  omit,  certainly,  to  reiterate  the  solemn  obliga- 
tions which  rest  on  every  citizen  of  this  republic  to  cherish 
and  enforce  the  great  principles  of  our  Colonial  and  Revolu- 
tionary fathers,  —  the  principles  of  Liberty  and  Law,  one 
and  inseparable,  —  the  principles  of  the  Constitution  and  the 
Union. 

I  could  not  omit  to  urge  on  every  man  to  remember  that 
self-government  politically  can  only  be  successful,  if  it  be 
accompanied  by  self-government  personally ;  that  there  must 
be  government  somewhere ;  and  that  if  the  people  are  indeed 
to  be  sovereigns,  they  must  exercise  their  sovereignty  over 
themselves  individually,  as  well  as  over  themselves  in  the 
aggregate,  —  regulating  their  own  lives,  resisting  their  ow^n 
temptations,  subduing  their  own  passions,  and  voluntarily 
imposing  upon  themselves  some  measure  of  that  restraint  and 
discipline  which,  under  other  systems,  is  supplied  from  the 


^  On  this  occasion  Mr.  Winthrop  had  before  him  the  writing-desk  of 
Jeiferson,  the  same  on  which  he  wrote  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
—  a  desk  subsequently  presented  to  the  United  States  by  the  children  of 
Jefferson's  j^randdaughter,  Mrs.  Joseph  Coolidge  of  Boston.  See  the  Pro- 
ceedings of  Congress  for  April  23,  1880,  with  speeches  then  made  by 
Senators  and  Representatives  from  Massachusetts  and  Virginia,  together 
with  a  letter  from  Mr.  Winthrop  on  the  subject. 


292  A  MEMOIR   OF 

armories  of  arbitrary  power,  —  the  discipline  of  virtue  in  the 
place  of  the  discipline  of  slavery. 

I  could  not  omit  to  caution  them  against  the  corrupting  in- 
fluences of  intemperance,  extravagance,  and  luxury.  I  could 
not  omit  to  warn  them  against  political  intrigue,  as  well  as 
against  personal  licentiousness ;  and  to  implore  them  to  regard 
principle  and  character,  rather  than  mere  party  allegiance,  in 
the  choice  of  men  to  rule  over  them. 

I  could  not  omit  to  call  upon  them  to  foster  and  further  the 
cause  of  universal  education ;  to  give  a  liberal  support  to  our 
schools  and  colleges  ;  to  promote  the  advancement  of  science 
and  art,  in  all  their  multiplied  divisions  and  relations ;  and  to 
encourage  and  sustain  all  those  noble  institutions  of  charity 
which,  in  our  own  land  above  all  others,  have  given  the  crown- 
ing grace  and  glory  to  modern  civilization. 

I  could  not  refrain  from  pressing  upon  them  a  just  and 
generous  consideration  for  the  interests  and  the  rights  of  their 
lellow-men  everywhere,  and  an  earnest  effort  to  promote  peace 
and  good-will  among  the  nations  of  the  earth. 

I  could  not  refrain  from  reminding  them  of  the  shame,  the 
unspeakable  shame  and  ignominy,  which  would  attach  to  those 
who  should  show  themselves  unable  to  uphold  the  glorious 
fabric  of  self-government  which  had  been  founded  for  them  at 
such  a  cost  by  their  fathers.  '  Videte,  videte,  ne,  ut  illis  pulcJier- 
imum  fiiit  tantam  vohis  imperii  gloriam  relinquere,  sic  nobis 
turpissimum  sit,  illud  qiiod  accepistis,  titer i  et  conservare  non 
posse  ! ' 

And  surely,  most  surely,  I  could  not  fail  to  invoke  them  to 
imitate  and  emulate  the  examples  of  virtue  and  purity  and 
patriotism  which  the  great  founders  of  our  Colonies  and  of 
our  Nation  had  so  abundantly  left  them. 

But  could  I  stop  there  ?  Could  I  hold  out  to  them,  as  the 
results  of  a  long  life  of  observation  and  experience,  nothing 
but  the  principles  and  examples  of  great  men  ? 

Who  and  what  are  great  men  ?  '  Woe  to  the  country,'  said 
Metternich  to  Ticknor,  forty  years  ago,  '  whose  condition  and 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  293 

institutions  no  longer  produce  great  men  to  manage  its 
affairs.'  The  Austrian  statesman  applied  his  remark  to 
England  at  that  day  ;  but  his  woe  —  if  it  be  a  woe  —  would 
have  a  wider  range  in  our  time,  and  leave  hardly  any  land 
unreached.  Certainly  we  hear  it  nowadays,  at  every  turn, 
that  never  before  has  there  been  so  striking  a  disproportion 
between  supply  and  demand,  as  at  this  moment,  the  world 
over,  in  the  commodity  of  great  men. 

But  who  and  what  are  great  men  ?  '  And  now  stand  forth,' 
says  an  eminent  Swiss  historian,  who  had  completed  a  survey 
of  the  whole  history  of  mankind,  at  the  very  moment  when, 
as  he  says,  '  a  blaze  of  freedom  is  just  bursting  forth  beyond 
the  ocean,'  —  '  and  now  stand  forth,  ye  gigantic  forms,  shades 
of  the  first  Chieftains,  and  Sons  of  Gods,  who  glimmer  among 
the  rocky  halls  and  mountain  fortresses  of  the  ancient  world ; 
and  you.  Conquerors  of  the  world  from  Babylon  and  from 
Macedonia ;  ye  Dynasties  of  Caesars,  of  Huns,  Arabs,  Moguls, 
and  Tartars ;  ye  Commanders  of  the  Faithful  on  the  Tigris, 
and  Commanders  of  the  Faithful  on  the  Tiber;  you  hoary 
Counsellors  of  Kings  and  Peers  of  Sovereigns ;  Warriors  on 
the  car  of  Triumph,  covered  with  scars  and  crowned  with 
laurels;  ye  long  rows  of  Consuls  and  Dictators,  famed  for 
your  lofty  minds,  your  unshaken  constancy,  your  ungovern- 
able spirit,  —  stand  forth  and  let  us  survey  for  a  while  your 
assembly,  like  a  Council  of  the  Gods  !  What  were  ye  ?  The 
first  among  mortals  ?  Seldom  can  you  claim  that  title  !  The 
best  of  men?  Still  fewer  of  you  have  deserved  such  praise! 
Were  ye  the  compellers,  the  instigators  of  the  human  race, 
the  prime  movers  of  all  their  works  ?  Rather  let  us  say  that 
you  were  the  instruments,  that  you  were  the  wheels  by  whose 
means  the  Invisible  Being  has  conducted  the  incomprehen- 
sible fabric  of  universal  government  across  the  ocean  of 
time ! ' 

Instruments  and  wheels  of  the  Invisible  Governor  of  the 
Universe!  This  is  indeed  all  which  the  greatest  of  men 
ever  have  been,  or  ever  can  be.     No  flatteries  of  courtiers, 


294  A  MEMOIR   OF 

no  adulations  of  the  multitude,  no  audacity  of  self-reliance, 
no  intoxications  of  success,  no  evolutions  or  developments 
of  science,  —  can  make  more  or  other  of  them.  This  is  '  the 
sea-mark  of  their  utmost  sail,'  —  the  goal  of  their  farthest 
run,  —  the  very  round  and  top  of  their  highest  soaring. 

Oh,  if  there  could  be  to-day  a  deeper  and  more  pervading 
impression  of  this  great  truth  throughout  our  land,  and  a 
more  pervading  conformity  of  our  thoughts  and  words  and 
acts  to  the  lessons  which  it  involves,  —  if  we  could  lift  our- 
selves to  a  loftier  sense  of  our  relations  to  the  Invisible,  — 
if,  in  surveying  our  past  history,  we  could  catch  larger  and 
more  exalted  views  of  our  destinies  and  our  responsibilities, 
—  if  we  could  realize  that  the  want  of  good  men  may  be  a 
heavier  woe  to  a  land  than  any  want  of  what  the  world  calls 
great  men,  —  our  Centennial  Year  would  not  only  be  signa- 
lized by  splendid  ceremonials  and  magnificent  commemora- 
tions and  gorgeous  Expositions,  but  it  would  go  far  towards 
fulfilling  something  of  the  grandeur  of  that '  Acceptable  Year' 
which  was  announced  by  higher  than  human  lips,  and  would 
be  the  auspicious  promise  and  pledge  of  a  glorious  second 
century  of  Independence  and  Freedom  for  our  country. 

For,  if  that  second  century  of  self-government  is  to  go  on 
safely  to  its  close,  or  is  to  go  on  safely  and  prosperously  at 
all,  there  must  be  some  renewal  of  that  old  spirit  of  subordi- 
nation and  obedience  to  Divine  as  well  as  human  laws,  which 
has  been  our  security  in  the  past.  There  must  be  faith  in 
something  higher  and  better  than  ourselves.  There  must 
be  a  reverent  acknowledgment  of  an  Unseen,  but  All-seeing, 
All-controlling  Ruler  of  the  Universe.  His  Word,  His  Day, 
His  House,  His  Worship,  must  be  sacred  to  our  children,  as 
they  have  been  to  their  fathers  ;  and  His  blessing  must  never 
fail  to  be  invoked  upon  our  land  and  upon  our  liberties. 
The  patriot  voice,  which  cried  from  the  balcony  of  yonder 
old  State  House,  when  the  Declaration  had  been  originally 
proclaimed,  'Stability  and  perpetuity  to  American  Indepen- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  295 

dence,'  did  not  fail  to  add,  '  God  save  our  American  States.'  ^ 
I  would  prolong  that  ancestral  prayer.  And  the  last  phrase 
to  pass  my  lips  at  this  hour,  and  to  take  its  chance  for  re- 
membrance or  oblivion  in  years  to  come,  as  the  conclusion 
of  this  Centennial  Oration,  and  the  sum  and  summing  up  of 
all  I  can  say  to  the  present  or  the  future,  shall  be:  —  There 
is,  there  can  be,  no  Independence  of  God:  In  Him,  as  a 
Nation,  no  less  than  in  Him,  as  individuals,  'we  live,  and 
move,  and  have  our  being.'  God  save  our  American 
States  ! 

In  the  General  Election  of  1876  he  took  no  part 
except  to  allow  the  publication  of  a  short  letter  to 
Charles  Francis  Adams,  which  contained  the  following 
passage :  — 

At  a  moment  when  you  are  the  subject  of  much  severe  and 
unjust  animadversion,  I  am  unwilling  to  let  the  election  go 
by  without  saying  to  you  formally  what  I  said  in  casual 
conversation  with  you  many  weeks  ago.  I  am  for  you  and 
with  you  in  all  your  views  of  the  present  condition  of  public 
affairs,  and  shall  give  my  vote  accordingly  for  yourself  and 
Mr.  Tilden.2     I   have   a   great   regard   for   Governor  Rice, 

1  The  reference  is  to  James  Bowdoin,  who,  as  President  of  the  Coun- 
cil of  Massachusetts,  promulgated  the  Declaration  of  Independence  in 
Boston. 

2  Mr.  Adams  was  then  actively  supporting  Tilden  for  the  Presidency 
and  had  consented  to  run  for  Governor  of  Massachusetts  against  Alex- 
ander H.  Rice,  the  Republican  candidate.  Bitter  attacks  had  been  made 
upon  him,  the  President  of  Harvard  University,  among  others,  designat- 
ing the  opponents  of  the  Republican  party  as  "  rebels  and  copperheads," 
while  Mr.  Blaine  arraigned  three  generations  of  a  historic  family  in  a 
savage  but  entertaining  indictment.  According  to  him,  not  only  had 
old  John  Adams,  "the  best  of  the  three,"  ruined  the  Federalist  party 
and  then  passed  the  latter  part  of  his  life  in  "querulous  attempts  to 
throw  the  responsibility  on  Hamilton  ; "  but  John  Quincy  Adams  had 
completely  wrecked  the  great  party  of  Monroe,  and  w^ould  be  chiefly 
remembered  "  as  the  author  of  a  diary  conspicuous  for  its  malignity,  and 
father  of  a  son  unwise  enough  to  publish  it."     "  No  Adams,"  added  Mr. 


296  A  MEMOIR  OF 

and  entire  confidence  in  tlie  purity  and  patriotism  of  Mr. 
Hayes.  But  I  hold  with  you,  that  the  best  hope,  if  not  the 
only  hope,  of  putting  a  stop  to  corruption  at  Washington, 
and  of  restoring  peace  and  harmony  at  the  South,  is  in  a 
thorough  change  of  the  National  Administration.  I  have 
no  fear  that  such  a  change  will  endanger  the  great  issues  of 
the  late  war,  much  less  that  it  will  disturb  our  national  credit 
at  home  or  abroad.  Such  suggestions  seem  to  me  only  the 
desperate  resort  of  a  party  clinging  to  power.  The  whole 
idea  that  our  elections  are  to  turn  on  the  probable  price  of 
American  securities  in  foreign  markets  is  humiliating. 

Mr.  Webster  had  then  been  in  his  grave  four  and  twenty 
years,  and  the  hostility  of  a  few  of  his  followers  to  Mr. 
Winthrop  had  long  since  become  a  thing  of  the  past. 
A  bronze  statue  of  the  former,  the  gift  of  a  wealthy 
New  York  merchant,  was  about  to  be  unveiled  in  Cen- 
tral Park  by  Mr.  Evarts,  who  represented  New  York 
and  the  donor;  while  Mr.  Winthrop,  by  common  con- 
sent, went  on  to  represent  Boston  and  the  associates 
of  Webster.  His  short  address  on  this  occasion  (Nov. 
25,  1876),  appreciative  but  discriminating,  was  con- 
sidered worthy  of  the  career  and  character  of  its  great 
subject,  and  should  be  read  in  connection  with  a  paper 
by  the  same  author  entitled  "  Webster's  Reply  to 
Hayne,  and  his  General  Methods  of  Preparation."^ 


Blaine,  "  ever  headed  a  party  without  taking  the  life  out  of  it.  The  Re- 
publican party  can  be  beaten  in  1876  and  still  have  a  future ;  but  with 
Charles  Francis  Adams  for  a  candidate,  it  would  never  have  breathed 
again." 

1  The  greater  part  of  this  paper  was  written  in  1877,  but  a  pressure 
of  engagements  caused  it  to  be  laid  aside  and  it  was  not  finished  until 
the  year  before  Mr.  Winthrop  died.  It  first  appeared  in  "  Scribner's 
Magazine  "  for  January,  1894,  where  it  attracted  marked  attention. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  297 

[Jan.  31,  1877.]  Moody  and  Sankey  are  in  full  blast  here, 
and  I  hope  they  will  do  good.  We  need  revivals  (in  their 
best  sense)  everywhere.  I  wish  I  could  have  been  a  Wesley, 
or  a  Whitefield  even,  sed  non  cuivis  adire  Corintho.  And  if 
one  begins  to  wish,  why  not  wish  to  be  a  Paul  outright !  I 
only  meant  to  imply  the  deep  sense  I  have  of  the  grandeur 
and  glory  of  talents  devoted  to  Evangelical  work.  It  was 
one  of  my  ambitions  to  compose  a  hymn  worthy  of  a  place  in 
a  church  collection,  but  I  never  could  satisfy  myself.  Watts, 
Cowper,  and  Wesley  will  live  longer  on  the  tongues  of  men 
by  their  hymns  than  Longfellow,  Holmes,  or  Whittier  by 
any  of  their  productions.  Such  music  used  to  have  a  special 
charm  for  me.  I  recall  it  at  least  sixty  years  ago  when  I  was 
a  school-boy,  and  when  six  or  seven  sisters  and  brothers  used 
to  gather  around  the  piano,  while  my  father  and  mother  sat 
listening  to  such  grand  old  tunes  as  Hotliam  and  Denmark 
and  Cheshunt.  It  was  the  'Lock  Hospital  Collection'  of 
tunes  on  which  I  was  brought  up,  and  our  favorite  hymns 
were  '  Jesus,  Lover  of  my  soul,'  '  Our  Lord  has  risen  from 
the  dead,'  and  '  Before  Jehovah's  awful  throne.'  The  mem- 
ory of  these  and  other  hymns  often  comes  over  me  on  a 
Sunday  night,  and  brings  back  a  family  group  —  of  which  I 
was  the  youngest,  and  am  now  the  only  survivor — as  vividly 
as  I  hope  one  day  to  see  it  above. 

[Newport,  Aug.  24,  1877.]  William  Beach  Lawrence  told 
me  to-day  that  Sumner  told  him,  in  1872,  that  the  Coalition 
should  have  nominated  him  (Sumner)  for  President  instead  of 
Greeley,  and  that  he  could  have  carried  the  election !  I  have 
some  doubt  about  the  entire  accuracy  of  this,  as  Lawrence  does 
not  seem  to  me  the  sort  of  person  in  whom  Sumner  would  have 
been  likely  to  confide  freely.  This  reminds  me  of  a  long  talk 
I  had  with  Thurlow  Weed  in  New  York  last  May,  when,  in 
reviewing  the  past,  he  told  me  some  queer  things  about  dif- 
ferent people,  some  of  which  I  should  hardly  care  to  repeat. 
He  added  that  Evarts  had  told  him  that  Hayes  would 
have  liked  to  offer  me  the  mission  to  England,  but  that  my 


298  A   MEMOIR   OF 

published  letter  to  Mr.  Adams  made  this  out  of  the  question. 
I  have  nothing  to  regret  in  that  letter,  nor  could  I,  in  any 
case,  have  accepted  the  post,  as  my  health  is  altogether  too 
uncertain  and  unsatisfactory.  I  manage  to  get  through  a 
good  deal  of  work,  and  can  pull  myself  together  for  a  great 
occasion,  but  I  feel  wretchedly  much  of  the  time,  and  have 
had  some  warnings  which  make  me  think  I  am  not  long  for 
this  world.  Aside  from  this,  I  prefer  that  the  high  opinion  I 
have  formed  of  President  Hayes  should  seem  unbiassed  by 
any  personal  considerations. 

Among  his  utterances  of  this  and  the  following  year 
may  be  alluded  to  in  passing  a  speech  when  presiding  at 
the  Festival  of  the  Boston  Latin  School  (Nov.  15,  1877), 
another  at  the  Harvard  Alumni  dinner  of  June  26,  1878, 
the  fiftieth  anniversary  of  his  own  class,  —  when  he  was 
accompanied  by  his  kinsman,  Lord  Dufferin,  then  Gov- 
ernor-General of  Canada,  who  was  on  a  visit  to  him  at 
Brookline,  —  and  a  third  at  the  Salem  celebration  of 
Sept.  18,  1878,  when  Dean  Stanley  was  his  guest. 
Among  the  many  invitations  which  from  time  to  time 
he  had  been  compelled  to  decline,  was  one  to  deliver  the 
address  at  the  unveiling  of  the  statue  of  Henry  Clay, 
at  Louisville,  in  the  spring  of  1867.  He  had  always 
regretted  having  been  unable  to  do  this,  and  in  1879 
he  willingly  complied  with  a  request  from  the  New 
England  Historic  Genealogical  Society  to  prepare  a 
memoir  of  Clay  for  the  first  volume  of  their  "  Memorial 
Biographies."  This  memoir,  which  was  separately 
printed  in  pamphlet  form,  is  also  to  be  found  in  his 
own  fourth  volume,  and  has  probably  been  as  much 
read  and  as  much  praised  as  anything  he  ever  wrote, 
though  it  does  not  pretend  to  be  more  than  a  compre- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  299 

hensive  sketch  of  a  very  remarkable  career.  In  Octo- 
ber of  tlie  same  year  he  retired  from  Presidency  of  the 
Boston  Provident  Association  after  twenty-five  years' 
service,  during  which,  to  use  the  recorded  language  of 
our  lamented  associate,  Hon.  Francis  E.  Parker:  — 

"  Mr.  Winthrop  has  been  the  head  of  this  Association,  not  in 
name  only,  but  in  fact.  He  brought  to  us  not  only  the  respect 
due  to  eminent  national  services  and  an  honored  name,  but 
the  power  of  organization  and  skill  in  administration  which 
were  natural  to  his  character,  and  had  been  matured  by  expe- 
rience of  weighty  and  conspicuous  public  affairs.  His  con- 
stant and  punctual  presence  at  our  meetings  has  added  both 
despatch  and  dignity  to  the  transaction  of  our  business.  His 
name  has  brought  to  us  the  most  important  of  the  legacies 
which  we  have  received ;  and  it  is  within  bounds  to  say  that, 
for  the  generous  endowment  of  our  Association,  including  the 
large  reversionary  interest  in  Mr.  Eastburn's  estate,  we  are  as 
much  indebted  to  him  as  if  it  had  been  his  direct  gift.  It  is 
to  his  influence  and  exertion,  more  than  to  any  one  cause,  that 
the  public  owes  the  ample  and  commodious  building  which, 
as  a  general  Bureau  of  Charity,  now  shelters  many  of  the  prin- 
cipal Associations  of  Boston.  As  the  first  Chairman  of  the 
Overseers  of  the  Poor,  under  the  new  organization,  he  did 
more  than  any  other  person  to  shape  that  important  charity, 
and  to  bring  it  into  harmony  with  our  own."  ^ 

[Washington,  April  25,  1880.]  My  annual  visit  to  the 
capital  is  always  pleasant.  People  are  very  kind,  and  grow 
more  and  more  to  regard  me  as  a  sort  of  link  with  the  past. 
I  sat  some  time  yesterday  with  Alexander  H.  Stephens,  at  the 
National  Hotel,  in  the  room  in  which  Clay  died,  and  in  which 
Stephens  says  he  expects  to  die  ere  long.     He  is  feeble,  but 

1  Annual  Report  of  the  Boston  Provident  Association,  October,  1870, 
which  also  contains  a  warm  tribute  to  Mr.  Winthrop's  services  from  the 
Senior  Vice-President  of  the  Association,  another  valued  member  of  this 
Society,  the  late  Rev.  Dr.  Samuel  Kirkland  Lothrop. 


300  A   MEMOIR  OF 

impulsive  as  ever,  telling  me,  among  other  things,  that  when 
he  recently  urged  Hancock  for  the  Presidency,  he  was  told 
the  latter  had  not  money  enough^  and  that  he  now  thought  he 
should  go  for  Grant !  Money  or  not,  I  certainly  prefer  Han- 
cock to  Tilden,  all  things  considered.  Mrs.  President  Hayes 
has  driven  me  to  Rock  Creek  Church,  which  I  had  never  seen 
before.  It  was  built  in  1719,  repaired  in  1775,  and  had  quite 
a  look  of  Old  England.  The  sexton,  a  character  in  his  way, 
informed  me  that  before  entering  on  his  present  functions  he 
had  been  successively  in  the  service  of  Dr.  Pusey,  George 
Grote,  and  Fanny  EUsler,  a  curious  juxtaposition  of  celebrities. 
What  you  say  of  parts  of  J.  Q.  A.'s  diary  is  substantially  true. 
He  undoubtedly  kept  gall  and  wormwood  in  his  inkstand  for 
daily  use,  but  he  was  a  charming  old  man  all  the  same.  He 
fulfilled  the  character  which  he  gave  to  Roger  Williams,  — 
*  that  conscientious,  contentious  man.'  It  is  a  great  gratifica- 
tion to  me  to  have  procured  the  restoration  and  proper  care  of 
Ary  Scheffer's  Lafayette  in  the  Capitol.  General  Garfield  has 
been  most  obliging  in  the  matter.  This  portrait,  and  the  one 
of  John  Hampden  in  the  White  House,  ought  never  to  have 
been  allowed  to  reach  such  a  stage  of  neglect  as  that  in  which  I 
have  successively  found  them.  Another  great  satisfaction  to 
me  has  been  in  co-operating  with  others  to  secure  the  erection 
of  some  sort  of  monument  to  our  old  friend  Joe  Gales. ^ 

A  characteristic  instance  of  Mr.  Wintbrop's  readiness, 
at  the  age  of  more  than  threescore  and  ten,  was  exhib- 
ited in  the  following  month,  at  the  centennial  celebra- 
tion of  the  American  Academy  of  Arts  and  Sciences, 
in  the  Old  South  Church,  Boston,  May  26,  1880,  when 
the  appointed  orator  was  Charles  Francis  Adams, 
who  was  taken  ill  the  day  before,  and  whose  manu- 

^  Joseph  Gales,  for  nearly  half  a  century  editor  of  the  "  National 
Intelligencer,"  and  a  great  favorite  of  all  the  prominent  men  of  the  Whig 
party,  had  died  in  Washington  in  1860. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  301 

script  could  not  be  found.  As  invited  guests  had 
arrived  from  different  parts  of  the  country,  and  even 
from  Europe,  an  appeal  was  made  to  Mr.  Winthrop  to 
come  to  the  rescue,  and  though  he  had  less  than  twenty- 
four  hours'  notice,  he  managed  to  prepare  an  instructive 
and  commemorative  address,  forty  minutes  long,  besides 
presiding  at  the  banquet  and  introducing  the  speakers. 

[July  24, 1880.]  I  to-day  mailed  Justin  Winsor  my  prom- 
ised chapter  for  his  '  Memorial  History  of  Boston.'  It  is  not 
what  I  would  but  what  I  could,  having  been  written  under 
all  sorts  of  distractions  and  adverse  influences.  Intended  to 
be  a  sketch  of  the  early  history  of  Massachusetts,  I  should 
rather  call  it  a  skeleton ;  but,  such  as  it  is,  it  has  been  a  labor 
of  love  and  may  answer  its  purpose.  I  have  begun  a  paper  on 
the  relations  of  tLe  Massachusetts  Puritans  to  the  Church  of 
England,  which  I  hope  some  day  to  read  to  the  Historical 
Society. 

Two  months  later  he  wrote  for  publication  to  the 
editor  of  the  Boston  "Post,"  as  follows:  — 

[Brookline,  Sept.  80,  1880.]  I  am  sorry  to  see  my  name  at 
the  head  of  the  list  of  Vice-Presidents  of  the  Democratic  meet- 
ing last  night.  I  am  duly  sensible  of  the  compliment,  but  it 
was  without  my  consent.  For  many  years  past  I  have  been 
altogether  an  independent  voter.  During  this  period  I  have 
repeatedly  supported  Democratic  candidates,  and  I  am  quite 
likely  to  do  so  again  ;  but  I  have  sometimes  voted  the  Repub- 
lican ticket,  and  prefer  to  remain  unconnected  with  any  party 
organization. 

I  have,  however,  nothing  to  conceal,  and  this  occasion 
obliges  me  to  say  frankly  that  I  am  opposed  to-day,  as  I  al- 
ways have  been,  to  any  concerted  array  of  solid  Norths  against 
solid  Souths.  These  sectional  antagonisms  and  contentions 
are  worthy  of  all  reprobation ;  and  never  more  so  than  when 


302  A  MEMOIR  OF 

fomented  and  kept  alive,  on  the  one  side  or  on  the  other,  for 
the  purpose  of  prolonging  party  power.  They  brought  on  the 
war ;  and  they  still  interfere  with  the  best  fruits  of  peace. 
The  condition  of  the  freedmen  themselves  —  their  prospects 
of  education  and  their  secure  enjoyment  of  all  the  privileges 
of  citizenship  — would,  in  my  judgment,  be  far  more  hopeful 
if  the  pressure  of  a  solid  North  were  taken  off  from  the 
Southern  States,  and  if  they  could  cease  to  feel,  whether 
reasonably  or  unreasonably,  that  they  were  under  the  domin- 
ion of  conquerors.  This  is  the  great  consideration  which 
weighs  on  my  own  mind,  in  view  of  the  coming  election,  and 
which  will  control  my  vote.  It  is  not  a  question  of  candidates 
or  persons.  It  is  not  a  question  of  parties  or  platforms.  It 
is  not  a  question  whether  the  decision  of  the  Electoral  Com- 
mission, four  years  ago,  was  just  or  unjust.  Nor  is  it,  with  me, 
any  question  as  to  the  administration  of  President  Hayes, 
which  has  been  so  generally  acceptable.  But  my  vote  will 
be  influenced  solely  by  the  desire  to  help  in  breaking  up  the 
intense  sectionalism  which  has  so  long  prevailed  in  our  land. 
I  long  to  see  the  Southern  people  once  more  divided  into 
parties,  as  they  were  when  I  was  in  active  public  life,  —  not 
by  caste,  or  color,  or  sympathy  with  a  lost  cause,  but  accord- 
ing to  their  honest  judgment  of  what  is  best  for  the  whole 
country.  But  the  North  must  concur,  and  even  lead  the 
way  in  this  patriotic  obliteration  of  sectional  prejudices,  or 
it  will  fail  to  be  accomplished.  Let  me  only  add,  that  I  am 
not  one  of  those  who  foresee  dangers  to  our  institutions,  or 
to  the  general  prosperity  of  the  country,  in  the  success  of  the 
Democratic  party.  Nor,  in  view  of  the  great  uncertainties  of 
the  result,  does  it  seem  wise  to  create  a  panic  in  advance  by 
exaggerated  partisan  predictions.  In  my  opinion,  there  has 
never  been  a  moment  since  the  war  ended  when  it  would 
have  been  safer  to  intrust  the  government  to  such  a  man  as 
General  Hancock,  with  the  assurance  that  it  would  be  admin- 
istered upon  principles  as  broad  as  the  Constitution  and 
as  comprehensive  as  the  Union. 


EGBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  303 

[Nov.  17,  1880.]  I  took  no  very  active  part  in  the  recent 
General  Convention  of  our  Church  in  New  York.  Since 
Dr.  Barnas  Sears's  death  a  large  burden  of  the  business  of  the 
Peabody  Trust  has  fallen  upon  me  and  engrossed  much  of 
my  time.  I  think  I  may  say  without  vanity  that  Southern 
schools  owe  me  much.  I  shall  let  Dr.  Holmes  see  what  you 
think  of  him.  His  vivacity,  in  the  derivative,  as  well  as  in 
every  other  sense,  is  marvellous,  and  his  style,  as  you  say, 
often  quite  exquisite.  I  have  a  notion  that  no  one  can  reach 
the  finest  harmonies  of  style  who  has  not  a  musical  ear. 
Prescott  had  no  music.  Ticknor  had  little  or  none,  Webster 
very  little,  and  Everett  none  at  all.  Holmes  has  an  abundance 
of  time  and  tune,  and  I  trace  them  in  his  composition.  For 
myself,  —  if  I  may  cite  myself  in  connection  with  style,  —  I 
have  almost  too  much  ear  for  music.  I  often  find  myself 
stopping  my  pen  to  catch  the  true  metre,  and  I  am  conscious 
that  music  enters  largely  into  my  literary  efforts.  Indeed,  I 
have  frequently  brought  out  a  sentence,  or  a  paragraph,  or  a 
page  or  more,  to  a  satisfactory  conclusion  and  climax,  —  after 
it  has  eluded  me  for  a  long  time,  —  under  the  inspiration  of 
one  of  Beethoven's  symphonies,  or  one  of  Mozart's  sonatas^ 
or  one  of  Handel's  choruses.  Your  views  and  my  own  of 
Carlyle  and  Emerson  do  not  differ  much.  I  doubt  whether 
the  former  is  an  accurate  historian,  and  I  do  not  always  get 
an  intelligent  idea  of  the  latter's  drift.  His  essay  on  Plato, 
for  instance,  which  I  have  been  lately  reading,  contains  some 
splendid  nehulce^  but  I  yearn  for  more  condensed  thought. 
Yet  he  is  a  most  amiable  and  lovable  person,  who  now  and 
then  writes  very  striking  things,  both  in  poetry  and  prose. 
No  two  men  could  be  more  unlike  than  he  and  Carlyle, — 
agreeing  in  little  except  their  admiration  for  each  other,  — 
the  one  a  bear,  and  the  other  a  lamb,  in  outward  demeanor. 
...  As  to  '  Endymion,'  there  are  clever  things  in  it,  as  in  all 
Disraeli's  novels.  He  is  certainly  a  very  remarkable  man, 
and  I,  for  one,  do  not  think  the  worse  of  him  as  a  statesman 
because  he  happens  to  be  the  self-made  son  of  a  Jewish  man 


304  A  MEMOIR  OF 

of  letters.  Dean  Stanley  once  told  me  he  had  read  '  Tan- 
cred '  over  and  over  again  on  account  of  its  admirable  de- 
scription of  the  Holy  Land. 

[Feb.  13,  1881.]  The  quotation  you  allude  to  is  from 
Matthew  xiii.  43.  There  is  nothing  more  exquisite  in  Holy 
Writ.  Following  as  it  does  upon  some  of  the  most  fearful 
images  of  future  punishment,  it  gathers  fresh  beauty  from 
the  contrast  and  is  like  a  strain  of  celestial  harmony  after 
the  most  harrowing  discords.  As  the  language  of  Christ 
himself,  succeeded  by  that  emphatic  warning,  '  he  that  hath 
ears  to  hear  let  him  hear,'  —  it  cannot  be  accepted  as  any 
mere  figure  of  speech.  Indeed,  I  know  of  nothing  in  the 
Bible  more  solemn  than  the  passages  which  immediately  pre- 
cede it.  In  my  opinion  the  tendency  of  modern  preaching 
is  far  too  much  in  the  direction  of  explaining  away  the  so- 
lemnities of  future  judgment.  We  are  soothingly  told  that, 
all  these  accounts  of  the  punishment  of  the  wicked  are  figu- 
rative, and  a  sort  of  sentimental,  intellectual  remorse  is  held 
out  as  the  worst  that  can  befall  a  sinner  hereafter.  Yet  these 
tremendous  verses  contain  —  not  a  parable  —  but  the  decla- 
ration and  unfolding  of  a  parable,  and  that  by  '  Him  that 
spake  as  never  man  spake.'  I  have  often  thought  that  those 
clergymen  take  a  fearful  responsibility,  who  so  often  bid  us 
discard  all  thought  about  rewards  and  punishments  as  the 
basis  of  goodness,  and  who  virtually  declare  that  in  dealing 
so  often  with  these  appeals  to  hope  and  fear^  and  in  holding 
up  so  frequently  these  representations  of  future  weal  and 
woe,  the  Saviour  himself  was  not  an  example  to  be  followed. 
If  old-fashioned  Orthodox  preachers  '  dealt  damnation  round 
the  land '  somewhat  too  coarsely  and  indiscriminately,  the 
modern  pulpit-orators  are  at  least  guilty  of  the  opposite  ex- 
treme when  they  strive  so  hard  to  explain  away  everything 
which  might  be  offensive  to  ears  polite.  .  .  .  The  reported 

conduct  of  is  shocking  and  lamentable,  but  every  day 

brings  its  revelations  of  human  frailty  and  wickedness,  and  I 
suppose  it  will  be  so  to  the  end.     What  hope,  indeed,  is  there 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  305 

of  anything  better,  when  in  so  many  quarters  table-tippings 
and  '  spiritual '  rappings  seem  to  have  taken  the  place  of  the 
Lord's  Supper  and  a  belief  in  the  Holy  Ghost?  The  idea 
that,  after  this  fitful  fever  is  ended,  we  may  be  summoned 
back  to  gossip  about  nothing  at  the  beck  and  call  of  imper- 
tinent worldlings  I  Is  this  the  fulfilment  of  the  declaration 
that  '  the  Spirit  shall  return  to  God  who  gave  it,'  and  how 
directly  is  it  at  war  with  the  Scripture  account  of  Dives,  who 
begged  in  vain  that  he  might  be  allowed  to  warn  his  breth- 
ren !  I  had  rather  take  my  chance  of  understanding  the 
secrets  of  the  other  world  by  reading  one  verse  of  the  New 
Testament  in  a  prayerful  spirit,  than  by  consulting  all  the 
mediums  that  have  'boasted  themselves  to  be  somebody,' 
from  Swedenborg  downwards.  .  .  .  Your  allusion  to  Paley's 
sermon  on  the  recognition  of  friends  in  another  world,  re- 
minds me  that  it  was  the  favorite  sermon  of  my  mother,  to 
whom  I  read  it  on  her  death-bed  in  1825.  How  many  friends 
there  will  be  to  be  recognized  !  Omnes  eodem  cogimur.  Paley, 
like  Jeremy  Taylor,  is  out  of  fashion,  but,  to  my  mind,  some 
of  his  short,  simple  discourses  are  worth  scores  of  what  are 
called  great  sermons  nowadays. 

XII. 

At  the  close  of  1880  Mr.  Winthrop  had  been  compli- 
mented by  an  invitation  from  both  branches  of  Congress 
to  be  the  orator  of  the  day  at  Yorktown  in  Virginia, 
Oct.  19, 1881,  at  a  celebration  by  the  Government  of  the 
United  States  of  the  hundredth  anniversary  of  the  Sur- 
render of  Cornwallis,  when  an  official  deputation  from 
France,  and  other  foreign  guests,  were  expected.  He 
accepted  this  appointment  with  some  misgivings,  lest,  at 
his  age,  he  should  fail  to  be  heard  in  the  open  air  by  a 
concourse  of  people ;  but  he  was  encouraged  by  the  great 
success  he  met  wdth  six  months  later^  in  delivering  on 

20 


306  A  MEMOIR   OF 

Bunker  Hill,  June  17,  1881,  a  commemorative  address 
at  the  unveiling  of  the  statue  of  Colonel  William  Pres- 
cott.  Making  all  proper  allowance  for  our  national 
tendency  to  exaggeration  and  jubilation,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  this  Yorktown  celebration  was,  in  its  princi- 
pal features,  a  great  success,  and  Mr.  Winthrop's  oration 
was  characterized  by  the  best  critics  not  merely  as  a 
masterpiece  of  historical  portraiture,  but  as  conceived  in 
the  kindest  spirit  towards  Great  Britain.-^  In  the  little 
volume  of  tributes  to  him  by  members  of  this  Society, 
our  late  associate,  Hamilton  A.  Hill,  has  given  a  graphic 
description  of  the  scene,  while  the  well-known  English 
correspondent,  Archibald  Forbes,  who  had  never  met  Mr. 
Winthrop  before,  wrote  appreciatively  of  his  "strong, 
clear,  sustained,  and  sympathetic  voice,"  his  "  fine,  ner- 
vous face,"  and  "the  absorbed  attention  in  which  he 
held  his  hearers."     I  quote  a  single  passage  :  — 

It  was  strikingly  said  by  a  great  moral  and  religious  writer 
of  the  mother  country  in  the  last  century,  in  relation  to  his 
own  land,  that  '  between  the  period  of  national  honor  and 
complete  degeneracy  there  is  usually  an  interval  of  national 
vanity,  during  which  examples  of  virtue  are  recounted  and 
admired,  without  being  imitated.'  Let  us  beware  lest  we 
should  be  approaching  such  an  interval  in  our  own  history  ! 
No  one  will  deny  that  there  is  enough  of  recounting  the  great 
examples  of  virtue  and  valor  and  patriotism  which  have 
been  left  us  by  our  fathers.     Voices  of  admiration  and  eulogy 

1  Its  length  may  surprise  some  readers,  but  it  was  his  custom,  in  the 
discharge  of  such  duties,  to  omit  parts  in  delivery.  Before  making  a 
political  speech  he  thought  over  what  he  wished  to  say,  reUed  much 
on  the  inspiration  of  the  moment,  writing  it  out  afterward  for  publica- 
tion, if  he  had  time.  In  his  commemorative  addresses  he  pursued  an 
opposite  course,  preparing  his  material  carefully  in  advance,  using  in 
delivery  as  much  as  seemed  desirable,  but  printing  the  whole. 


ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP.  307 

resound  throughout  the  land.  Statues  and  monuments  and 
obelisks  are  rising  at  every  corner.  There  can  hardly  be  too 
many  of  them.  But  vice  and  crime,  speculation  and  embez- 
zlement, corruption,  profligacy,  —  and  even  assassination, 
alas  !  —  stalk  our  streets  and  stare  up  at  such  memorials  unre- 
buked  and  unabashed.  And  are  there  not  symptoms  of 
malarias,  in  some  of  our  high  places,  more  pestilent  than  any 
that  ever  emanated  from  Potomac  or  even  Pontine  marshes, 
infecting  our  whole  civil  service,  and  tainting  the  very  life- 
blood  of  the  nation  ?  Let  me  not  exaggerate  our  dangers, 
or  dash  the  full  joy  of  this  anniversary  by  suggesting  too 
strongly  that  there  may  be  poison  in  our  cup.  But  I  must 
be  pardoned,  as  one  of  a  past  generation,  for  dealing  with 
old-fashioned  counsels  in  old-fashioned  phrases.  Profound 
dissertations  on  the  nature  of  government,  metaphysical 
speculations  on  the  true  theory  of  civil  liberty,  scientific  dis- 
sections of  the  machinery  of  our  own  political  system  —  even 
were  I  capable  of  them  —  would  be  as  inappropriate  as  they 
would  be  worthless.  Our  reliance  for  the  preservation  of 
Republican  liberty  can  only  be  on  the  common-place  princi- 
ples, and  common-place  maxims,  which  lie  within  the  com- 
prehension of  the  children  in  our  schools,  or  of  the  simplest 
and  least  cultured  man  or  woman  who  wields  a  hammer  or 
who  plies  a  needle.  The  fear  of  the  Lord  must  still  and  ever 
be  the  beginning  of  our  wisdom,  and  obedience  to  His  com- 
mandments the  rule  of  our  lives.  Crime  must  not  go  unpun- 
ished, and  vice  must  be  stigmatized  and  rebuked  as  vice. 
Human  life  must  be  held  sacred,  and  lawless  violence  and 
bloodshed  cease  to  be  regarded  as  a  redress  or  remedy  for 
anything.  It  is  not  by  murdering  Emperors  or  Presidents 
that  the  welfare  of  mankind  or  the  liberty  of  the  people  is  to 
be  promoted.  Such  acts  ought  to  be  as  execrable  in  the  sight 
of  man  as  they  are  in  the  sight  of  God.^     The  rights  of  the 

1  The  Emperor  of  Russia  (Alexander  TI.)  and  the  President  of  the 
United  States  (James  A.  Garfield)  had  both  been  assassinated  in  that 
year. 


308  A   MEMOIR   OF 

humblest,  as  well  as  of  the  highest,  must  be  respected  and 
enforced.  Labor,  in  all  its  departments,  must  be  justly  re- 
munerated and  elevated,  and  the  true  dignity  of  labor  recog- 
nized. The  poor  must  be  wisely  visited  and  liberally  cared 
for,  so  that  mendicity  shall  not  be  tempted  into  mendacity, 
nor  want  exasperated  into  crime.  The  great  duties  of  indi- 
vidual citizenship  must  be  conscientiously  discharged.  Peace, 
order,  and  the  good  old  virtues  of  honesty,  charity,  temper- 
ance and  industry,  must  be  cultivated  and  reverenced.  Pub- 
lic opinion  must  be  refined,  purified,  strengthened,  and 
rendered  prevailing  and  imperative,  by  the  best  thoughts  and 
best  words  which  the  press,  the  platform,  and  the  pulpit  can 
pour  forth.  .  .  . 

Tell  me  not  that  I  am  indulging  in  truisms.  I  know  they 
are  truisms ;  but  they  are  better  —  a  thousand  fold  better  — 
than  Nihilisms,  or  Communisms,  or  Fenianisms,  or  any  of  the 
other  isms  which  are  making  such  headway  in  supplanting 
them.  No  advanced  thought,  no  mystical  philosophy,  no 
glittering  abstractions,  no  swelling  phrases  about  freedom,  — 
not  even  science,  with  all  its  marvellous  inventions  and  dis- 
coveries—  can  help  us  much  in  sustaining  this  Republic. 
Still  less  can  any  godless  theories  of  Creation,  or  any  infidel 
attempts  to  rule  out  the  Redeemer  from  his  rightful  suprem- 
acy in  our  hearts,  afford  us  any  hope  of  security.  That  way 
lies  despair.  Commonplace  truths,  old  familiar  teachings, 
the  Ten  Commandments,  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the 
Farewell  Address  of  Washington,  honesty,  virtue,  patriotism, 
universal  education,  are  what  the  world  most  needs  in  these 
days,  and  our  own  part  of  the  world  as  much  as  any  other 
part.  Without  these  we  are  lost.  With  these,  and  with  the 
blessing  of  God,  which  is  sure  to  follow  them,  a  second  cen- 
tury of  our  Republic  may  be  confidently  looked  forward  to  ; 
and  those  who  shall  gather  on  this  field,  a  hundred  years 
hence,  shall  then  exult,  as  we  are  now  exulting,  in  the  con- 
tinued enjoyment  of  the  free  institutions  bequeathed  to  us  by 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  309 

our  fathers,  and  in  honoring  the  memory  of  those  who  have 
sustained  them !  ^ 

It  was  not  infrequently  the  ambition  of  fugitive  slaves 
who  had  earned  money  at  the  North  or  elsewhere,  to 
regularize  their  position  by  purchasing  free  papers  of 
their  owners,  and  to  procure  the  manumission  of  their 
families.  Such  negotiations  necessitated  the  deposit  of 
funds  in  the  hands  of  some  one  whose  name  inspired 
general  confidence,  and  between  1840  and  1860  Mr. 
Winthrop,  at  some  inconvenience,  repeatedly  consented 
to  be  the  go-between,  and  when  the  case  excited  his  sym- 
pathy, himself  contributed,  and  obtained  contributions 
from  others,  to  the  sum  needed.  The  result  was  a 
friendly  feeling  towards  him  on  the  part  of  several 
prominent  colored  men  in  Boston  and  "Washington,  to 
whose  agency,  as  he  supposed,  he  owed  an  exemption 
from  the  personal  attacks  habitually  made  upon  Con- 
servative leaders  at  the  political  meetings  of  that  race. 
He  was  therefore  a  good  deal  surprised,  early  in  1882, 
by  an  allusion  to  himself  in  the  autobiography  of 
Frederick  Douglass,  then  first  published.  After  drawing 
a  noteworthy  contrast  between  his  first  meeting  Mr. 

1  Not  the  least  agreeable,  but  certainly  the  most  unexpected,  of  his 
Yorktown  experiences  was  the  subsequent  action  of  one  hundred  and 
sixty  leading  citizens  of  Massachusetts,  without  distinction  of  party,  in 
furnishing  a  portrait  of  him  for  the  Speakers'  Corridor  in  the  Capitol  at 
W^ashington.  For  the  speeches  made  in  the  House  of  Representatives  at 
this  presentation  (June  27,  1882),  and  for  further  references  to  him  in 
the  same  place,  at  the  presentation  of  portraits  of  other  Massachusetts 
Speakers  (Jan.  19,1888),  see  the  "  Congressional  Record."  The  artist 
was  Daniel  Huntington,  who  painted  an  earlier  portrait  of  him,  now  in 
the  Peabody  Museum  at  Cambridge,  as  well  as  a  later  one  for  this  Society, 
which  also  possesses  a  bust  of  him  by  Dexter,  taken  soon  after  his  retire- 
ment from  Congress.  A  more  effective  bust,  by  Powers  (Florence,  1868), 
is  in  the  Library  at  Harvard.  - 


310  A   MEMOIR   OF 

Wintlirop,  when  waiting  behind  his  chair  at  a  dinner  in 
1838,  soon  after  his  escape  from  slavery,  and  their  be- 
coming personally  acquainted  when  speakers  at  Faneuil 
Hall  after  the  fall  of  Richmond,  twenty-seven  years 
later,  —  the  author  went  on  to  say  :  — 

"Regiment  after  regiment,  brigade  after  brigade,  had 
passed  over  Boston  Common  to  endure  the  perils  and  hard- 
ships of  war,  and  a  word  from  Robert  C.  Winthrop  would 
have  gone  far  to  nerve  those  young  soldiers  going  forth  to 
lay  down  their  lives  for  the  life  of  the  Republic  ;  but  no  word 
came  until  the  last  quarter  of  the  eleventh  hour,  when  the 
work  was  nearly  done.  The  time  when  the  Union  needed 
him  was  when  the  slaveholding  rebellion  was  raising  a 
defiant  head,  not  when  that  head  was  in  the  dust  and  ashes 
of  defeat  and  destruction." 

Having  reason  to  suspect  that  the  writer  had  been 
the  unconscious  instrument  of  the  ill-will  of  persons  with 
lighter  skins  than  his  own,  and  assuming  that  his  resi- 
dence in  Washington  might  occasionally  lead  him  to  the 
Library  of  Congress,  I  invited  him  to  run  his  eye  over 
the  table  of  contents  of  that  one  of  Mr.  Winthrop' s 
volumes  which  deals  with  the  period  of  the  Civil  War, 
and  then  let  me  know  how  far  he  considered  himself  jus- 
tified in  saying  what  he  had.  I  soon  after  received  a 
courteous  expression  of  regret  that  he  had  been  misled, 
a  regret  he  forthwith  repeated  in  the  newspapers,  add- 
ing an  explanatory  note  to  a  second  edition  then  going 
through  the  press.-^ 

1  In  the  subsequent  London  edition  he  changed  the  M'hole  passage, 
substituting  several  compliments.  I  am  particular  to  mention  all  this 
because  I  can  recall  no  instance  when  any  white  assailant  of  Mr. 
Winthrop  behaved  even  half  so  handsomely  when  a  mistake  of  fact  was 
pointed  out  to  him. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  311 

During  the  greater  part  of  1882  Mr.  Winthrop  was 
again  abroad,  where  he  enjoyed  himself  as  before, 
though  keenly  sensible  of  the  gaps  death  had  made  in 
the  circle  of  his  foreign  friends,  missing  particularly  in 
London  Sir  Henry  Holland,  Archdeacon  Sinclair,  Lord 
Stanhope  the  historian.  Dean  Stanley,  and  the  fourth 
Earl  of  St.  Germans,  —  in  Paris  Thiers,  from  whom  he 
had  experienced  much  hospitality,  and  Circourt,  with 
whom  he  had  corresponded  for  more  than  thirty  years .^ 
Among  the  pleasant  incidents  of  this,  his  last  stay  in 
Europe,  were  a  few  days  passed  at  the  historic  Chateau 
of  Rochambeau,  where  he  found  in  his  bedroom  a  por- 
trait of  Washington  given  by  the  latter  to  the  famous 
marshal  of  that  name, — a  breakfast  at  Chantilly  with 
the  Due  d'Aumale,  who  showed  him  many  of  the  rarest 
of  his  art  treasures,  —  and  a  renewal  of  former  inter- 
course with  Mignet,  the  venerable  French  historian,  to 
whose  memory,  it  may  be  remembered,  he  paid  a  fin- 
ished tribute  at  a  meeting  of  this  Society  in  April,  1884. 
Meantime,  Congress  had  taken  in  hand  the  completion 
of  the  National  Monument  to  Washington,  which,  origi- 
nally conceived  on  too  vast  a  scale,  had  been  suffered 
to  stand  unfinished  in  sight  of  the  Capitol,  through 
many  years  of  delay  and  discouragement.  On  the  13th 
of  May,  1884,  a  Resolution  was  approved  by  both 
Houses  designating  the  22d  of  February  in  the  follow- 
ing year  for  its  dedication  with  appropriate  ceremonies, 
and  naming  Mr.  Winthrop  the  orator  of  the  day,  an 
appointment  he  felt  much  hesitation  in  accepting,  but 

^  Count  Adolphe  de  Circourt,  one  of  the  most  accomplished  scholars 
of  his  time,  for  some  account  of  whom  see  the  seventeenth  volume  of  the 
"  Proceedings  "  of  this  Society,  of  which  he  was  an  honorary  member. 


312  A  MEMOIR   OF 

it  was  represented  to  liim  by  leading  members  of  the 
Congressional  Commission  that  the  interest  of  the  occa- 
sion would  be  enhanced  by  his  doing  so,  as,  nearly 
thirty-seven  years  before,  he  had  officiated  in  a  similar 
capacity  at  the  laying  of  the  corner-stone. 

[Boston,  June  1,  1884.]  You  may  be  interested  to  learn 
that,  at  a  Woman  Suffrage  meeting  here  some  days  ago,  I 
was  incidentally  denounced  as  having  in  my  political  career 
*  derided  and  defied  the  moral  sense  of  Massachusetts.'  I  have 
not  the  smallest  wish  ever  to  be  made  the  subject  of  a  cum- 
brous biography,  but  it  would  be  a  satisfaction  to  me  to  have 
clearly  set  forth  hereafter,  —  in  a  way  to  save  students  of 
political  history  the  trouble  of  wading  through  thick  volumes 
of  debates,  —  precisely  in  what  manner,  and  exactly  in  what 
language,  I  so  derided  and  defied  the  moral  sense  of  Massa- 
chusetts. I  make  no  pretension  to  have  been  infallible,  and 
I  dare  say  I  made  as  many  mistakes  as  my  neighbors,  but, 
on  the  whole,  I  am  satisfied  with  my  record  and  would  not 
change  it.  Bancroft  ^  has  been  urging  me  to  write  out  remi- 
niscences of  public  men  since  1832,  paying  me  the  compliment 
of  styling  me  a  '  dispassionate  and  just  judge  of  men  and 
parties.'  If  I  were  as  vigorous  at  seventy-five  as  he  is  at 
eighty-four,  I  might  try  to  find  time  for  something  of  the 
sort,  though  such  reminiscences  would  have  to  be  carefully 
edited  to  be  palatable  to  some  of  my  friends,  himself  among 
the  number.  Of  some  amusing  experiences  in  early  Whig 
politics,  I  was  reminded  at  Lenox  last  autumn  by  Julius 
Rockwell,  with  whom  I  passed  a  most  agreeable  hour.  In 
discussing  more  recent  events,  I  was  struck  by  the  justice  of 
his  concluding  remark.  '  It  is,'  said  he,  '  no  credit  to  the 
civilization  of  the  nineteenth  century  that  slavery  could  not 
have  been  abolished  without  that  horrid  war.'  Have  you 
read  Bacourt's  letters  ?  ^     It  seems  he  calls  Kennedy  and  me, 

^  George  Bancroft,  the  historian. 

2  Bacourt,   a  protegd  of   Talleyrand,   was   French  minister  to  the 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  313 

in  1841,  'les  deux  hommes  les  plus  comme  il  faut  de  cet 
Strange  monde  Am^ricain ' ;  but,  as  a  rule,  he  is  severe  and 
vituperative  to  a  degree  I  should  not  have  expected.  I  quite 
agree  to  what  you  say  of  Matthew  Arnold.  I  found  him 
pleasant  enough  at  table,  but  there  is  a  flippant  tone  about 
his  writings,  —  an  assumption  of  superior  insight,  to  say 
nothing  of  want  of  faith,  —  which  renders  them  distasteful 
to  me.  I  cannot  find  that  speech  you  ask  for,  though,  in 
searching  for  it,  I  came  across  the  manuscripts  of  two  for- 
gotten lectures  of  mine,  —  one,  in  Boston  in  1834,  on  the 
Elective  Franchise,  the  other,  in  Beverly  in  1838,  on  the 
Elevation  and  Dignity  of  Labor.  The  former  proved  to 
contain  not  a  few  of  the  Civil  Service  views  of  the  present 
hour,  and  the  latter  had  some  grains  of  wheat  amidst  the 
chaff;  but  neither  seemed  worth  keeping,  and  I  destroyed 
them. 

During  the  summer  and  autumn  of  1884  he  was  at 
times  a  good  deal  out  of  health,  but  managed  to  fulfil 
engagements  in  New  York  and  elsewhere,  besides  sub- 
stantially finishing  his  monument  oration.  Rarely  pru- 
dent in  the  matter  of  fatigue  and  exposure,  he  had  a 
theory  that  he  did  not  take  cold  as  readily  as  other 
people,  and  that  his  colds  never  amounted  to  much; 
but,  as  ill  luck  would  have  it,  he  suddenly  developed  one 
on  the  10th  of  December,  which  was  followed  by  pneu- 
monia and  threatened  to  prove  fatal.  For  more  than  a 
fortnight  he  hovered  between  life  and  death,  though  his 
mind  continued  clear,  and  on  one  occasion,  when  sup- 
posed to  be  in  extremis,  his  particular  friend,  Phillips 
Brooks,  then  Rector  of  Trinity,  afterward  Bishop  of 
Massachusetts,  offered  at  his  bedside  the  prayer  for  a 

United  States  in  the  early  years  of  Mr.  Winthrop's  Congressional  life, 
but  the  letters  alluded  to  were  not  published  till  1882. 


314  A  MEMOIR  OF 

sick  person  at  the  point  of  departure.  As  he  left  the 
house.  Dr.  Brooks  remarked  to  me  impressively  upon 
the  beauty  of  a  Christian's  death-bed;  but  the  uncer- 
tainties of  life  were  never  more  strikingly  manifested 
than  by  the  fact  that  more  than  eight  years  later  Mr. 
Winthrop  officiated  as  a  pall-bearer  at  the  funeral  of 
Bishop  Brooks,  and  wrote  the  Resolutions  of  the  Vestry 
of  Trinity  on  his  demise.  His  recovery,  however,  was 
so  slow  and  his  weakness  so  great,  that  it  was  obvious 
that  he  would  not  be  able  to  speak  in  public  in  Feb- 
ruary ;  and  it  was  arranged  that  his  address,  or  such 
portions  of  it  as  he  had  intended  to  deliver,  should  be 
read  for  him  by  some  suitable  person  designated  by 
himself.  As  it  was  important  that  the  person  so  desig- 
nated should  have  time  to  familiarize  himself  with  the 
production,  it  became  my  duty  to  consult  Mr.  Winthrop 
on  the  subject,  though  he  was  then  barely  able  to  articu- 
late. As  the  existing  Hall  of  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives, where  the  exercises  were  to  take  place,  requires 
an  exceptionally  practised  speaker  to  make  himself 
heard,  I  foresaw  he  would  be  fastidious  about  a  sub- 
stitute, but  I  was  not  prepared  for  the  melancholy 
groans  which  issued  from  his  pillow  as  I  succes- 
sively propounded  several  of  the  names  obligingly  sug- 
gested, though  when  I  reached  that  of  John  D.  Long, 
formerly  Governor  of  Massachusetts,  then  a  member  of 
Congress,  and  now  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  he  managed 
to  utter,  "  Yes,  if  he  will."  Governor  Long  was  neither 
an  intimate  friend  of  Mr.  Winthrop,  nor  at  all  in  sym- 
pathy with  his  political  views,  but  he  cheerfully  agreed 
to  perform  this  duty,  and  did  so  most  acceptably.  It 
was  a  bitter   disappointment   to   have   been   so   unex- 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROR  315 

pectedly  prevented  from  officiating  in  person  on  an 
occasion  which  seemed  so  appropriate  2b  finale  to  a  long 
oratorical  career;  but  he  was,  in  a  measure,  consoled 
by  receiving,  on  the  afternoon  of  the  celebration,  with 
other  complimentary  telegrams,  the  following  one, 
signed  by  both  the  Senators  and  all  the  Representatives 
of  the  Old  Bay  State  :  — 

"  Your  address  to-day  was  received  by  the  vast  audience 
with  unbounded  admiration  and  satisfaction.  We  are  proud 
that  Massachusetts,  by  your  genius  and  eloquence,  has  paid 
this  unsurpassed  tribute  to  the  fame  of  Washington." 

[March  15,  1885.]  People  are  very  kind  and  I  am  quite 
sure  I  do  not  deserve  half  the  compliments  I  get.  Whittier, 
for  instance,  referring  to  one  passage  in  my  address,  writes 
that  he  knows  of  '  nothing  finer  in  ancient  or  modern  elo- 
quence.' I  am  afraid  this  must  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of 
friendly  tonic  for  a  convalescent,  but  while  I  admit  that  I 
find  it  bracing,  I  am  really  none  too  well  satisfied  with  my 
own  performance.  As  some  one,  whose  name  I  have  forgot- 
ten, wrote,  'he  who  comes  up  to  his  own  idea  of  excellence, 
must  originally  have  had  a  very  low  standard  in  his  mind.' 
I  am  gradually  resuming  my  ordinary  occupations,  and  hope 
to  crawl  on  to  Washington  next  month  to  get  rid  of  our  east 
winds ;  but  after  so  prolonged  an  illness  at  so  advanced  an 
age,  it  would  be  idle  for  me  to  expect  to  regain  any  full 
measure  of  former  activity,  and  I  have  arranged  to  retire 
from  some  public  duties,  —  in  particular,  from  the  presidency 
of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society,  which  I  have  now 
held  for  thirty  years. 

This  long  tenure  of  office  had  been  illustrated,  at  the 
outset,  by  increased  attendance  at  and  interest  in  our 
monthly  meetings,  and,  in  its  progress,  by  very  material 
additions  to  our  pecuniary  resources  and  by  the  publi- 


316  A  MEMOIR   OF 

cation  of  no  less  than  thirty-nine  volumes  of  historical 
material,  to  many  of  which  he  had  largely  contributed.^ 
The  utterances  of  leading  members,  both  at  the  time 
of  his  retirement  and  of  his  death,  —  especially  the  re- 
marks of  his  two  successors  in  the  chair,^  and  that 
exceptionally  competent  judge,  the  Treasurer,^  —  de- 
scribe the  value  placed  upon  his  services ;  but  he  himself 
fully  realized  that,  while  it  had  been  his  privilege  and  his 
pleasure  to  be  foremost  in  our  undertakings,  his  success 
was  largely  due  to  the  cordial  and  zealous  co-operation 
of  many  valued  associates,  chief  of  whom  should  always 
be  remembered  our  late  Vice-President,  Charles  Deane. 
It  is,  moreover,  an  open  secret  that  Mr.  Winthrop  was 
not  in  accord  with  the  majority  of  the  Society  upon  the 
most  important  practical  question  which  came  before  it 
during  his  presidency.  Originally  intended  to  consist 
of  only  thirty  members,  a  number  increased  to  sixty  a 
few  years  later,  this  limit  was  raised  to  one  hundred  in 
1857,  a  change  due,  in  no  inconsiderable  degree,  to  Mr. 
Winthrop' s  influence.  Twenty  years  later,  in  1877,  he 
proposed  a  further  increase  to  one  hundred  and  fifty; 
but,  after  an  animated  debate,  his  plan  was  rejected 
by  a  vote  equivalent  to  two  to  one,  the  majority  be- 
ing strongly  of  opinion  that  the  limit  of  one  hundred 
should  be  a  permanent  one.  His  own  idea  was  that,  if 
sixty  was  not  too  large  an  outside-number  at  the  close 
of  the  last  century,  one  hundred  and  fifty  would  not 

1  Between  1855  and  1885  were  issued  seventeen  volumes  of  Collections 
and  twenty-one  volumes  of  Proceedings,  besides  a  volume  of  lectures  on 
the  early  history  of  Massachusetts  and  a  catalogue  of  the  Society's  library 
in  two  volumes. 

2  Dr.  George  E.  Ellis  and  Charles  Francis  Adams  the  younger. 
«  Charles  C.  Smith. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  317 

have  been  immoderate  eighty  years  later,  in  view  of  the 
wider  field  of  selection  created  by  the  growth  of  Massa- 
chusetts, —  and  that,  as  considerably  more  than  half  of 
our  members  are  habitually  debarred  from  taking  any 
active  part,  by  reason  of  age,  health,  absence,  official 
position,  or  the  engrossing  nature  of  their  occupations, 
it  would  not  be  unwise  to  let  down  the  bars  and  admit, 
from  time  to  time,  persons  from  whom  assistance  in 
the  work  of  publication  might  reasonably  be  expected 
and  who  are  liable  to  be  shut  out  by  the  existing  ar- 
rangement. Upon  this  work  of  publication  he  consid- 
ered that  the  Society's  wide  reputation  had  rested  in  the 
past  and  must  rest  in  the  future ;  but  while  he  rejoiced 
that  an  increased  income  made  it  possible  for  us,  if  we 
saw  fit,  to  employ  a  salaried  editor,  he  profoundly  re- 
gretted that  a  dearth  of  volunteers  should  necessitate  a 
change  from  the  ancient  method  by  which  this  editing 
was  done  by  committees  working  together  for  the  love  of 
history.^  A  diligent  student  of  all  classes  of  historical 
literature,  his  preference  was  for  writers  who  have  the 
art  to  keep  their  individual  prejudices  in  the  back- 
ground, and  who  seem  willing  to  allow  their  readers 
to  deduce  deliberate  opinions  from  an  apparently  un- 
biassed array  of  facts. 

History  [he  wrote  in  one  of  his  common-place  books]  is 
no  mere  rhetorical  or  sensational  narrative,  or  compound  of 
incidents  or  traditions,  caught  up  at  second-hand  or  at  ran- 
dom, to  sustain  a  preconceived  theory  or  a  favorite  view. 
That  only  is  worthy  of  the  name  of  history  which  is  founded 
on  impartial  research  and  diligent  sifting  of  original  records, 

1  For  a  paper  upon  this  question  of  membership,  submitted  to  the 
Society  after  Mr.  Winthrop's  death,  but  containing  repeated  references  to 
his  views,  see  2  Proceedings,  vol.  x.  pp.  315-327. 


318  A   MEMOIR  OF 

which  is  composed  in  the  spirit  of  a  judge  rather  than  of  an 
advocate,  and  which  ever  recognizes  and  ever  obeys  the  two 
great  laws  laid  down  by  the  matchless  Roman  orator :  Ne 
quid  falsi  dicer  e  audeat,  ne  quid  veri  non  audeat. 

Throughout  nearly  ten  years  during  which  his  life 
was  prolonged  after  this  resignation,  he  continued  to 
attend  our  meetings  as  often  as  he  was  able,  occa- 
sionally contributing  a  paper,  or  pronouncing  an  earnest 
tribute  to  the  memory  of  some  lamented  associate.  At 
the  head  of  a  few  institutions  he  preferred  still  to 
serve,  —  among  them  the  Children's  Hospital  of  Boston, 
the  prosperity  of  which  he  had  much  at  heart ;  the 
Massachusetts  Bible  Society,  at  the  annual  meetings  of 
which  he  was  in  the  habit  of  making  a  short  address ; 
the  Peabody  Museum  at  Cambridge,  the  interests  of 
which,  in  conjunction  with  his  friend,  Jeffries  Wyman, 
he  had  done  so  much  to  foster  in  the  beginning,  and  in 
connection  with  which  he  ultimately  founded  a  scholar- 
ship ;  the  Episcopal  Theological  School  at  Cambridge, 
his  long  association  with  which  is  pleasantly  recalled 
by  the  attractive  dormitory  which  bears  his  name ;  and 
that  great  Trust  for  Southern  Education  which  had 
absorbed  so  much  of  his  time  since  1867,  and  with  ref- 
erence to  which  he  maintained  an  onerous  correspond- 
ence until  a  few  weeks  before  his  death.  The  subject 
had  always  interested  him.  So  far  back  as  1854,  in 
response  to  an  invitation  to  take  part  in  the  celebra- 
tion of  the  fiftieth  anniversary  of  the  University  of 
South  Carolina,  he  had  written :  — 

For  myself,  I  cannot  hut  feel  that  whatever  is  done 
for  public  instruction,  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific,  is 
done  for  the  whole  country ;  and  I  can  hardly  rejoice  less  in 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  319 

the  progress  and  prosperity  of  a  college  at  Columbia  than  if 
it  were  at  my  own  Cambridge. 

At  a  later  period,  the  suffering  and  impoverished 
condition  of  the  South  in  the  years  immediately  succeed- 
ing the  Civil  War  caused  him  deep  anxiety,  and  believ- 
ing that  indiscriminate  negro  suffrage,  under  the  cir- 
cumstances in  which  it  was  forced  upon  a  conquered 
people,  was  a  great  wrong,  and  the  corrupt  and  illegal 
legislation  resulting  from  it  a  national  disgrace,  he  could 
see  but  one  possible  remedy  in  the  future,  the  diffusion 
of  knowledge  among  all  classes,  without  distinction  of 
color. 

Slavery  [he  said  at  Yorktown]  is  but  half  abolished,  eman- 
cipation is  but  half  completed,  while  millions  of  freemen 
with  votes  in  their  hands  are  without  education. 

All  his  life  in  independent  circumstances,  he  was 
never  a  rich  man,  which  he  often  regretted,  —  not 
that  he  had  any  wdsh  to  increase  his  personal  ex- 
penditure, but  because  perhaps  his  greatest  pleasure 
was  to  give  money  to  worthy  objects.  In  proportion 
to  his  moderate  income  he  gave  largely,  but  it  would 
have  been  a  real  delight  to  him  to  have  had  not  merely 
the  will  but  the  means  to  contribute,  from  time  to  time, 
important  sums  to  public  endowments,  among  which 
there  was  none  that  in  his  old  age  appealed  to  him 
more  strongly  than  institutions  of  learning  in  the  South- 
ern country.  It  was,  therefore,  a  very  agreeable  sur- 
prise w^hen,  in  recognition  of  what  he  had  done,  or 
tried  to  do,  for  Southern  education,  his  name  was 
given,  in  1886,  to  the  Winthrop  Training  School  for 
Teachers,  now  the  Winthrop    Normal    and    Industrial 


320  A  MEMOIR   OF 

College  of  South  Carolina,  at  Rock  Hill,  near  Columbia, 
the  corner-stone  of  the  fine  new  buildings  of  which  was 
laid,  with  appropriate  ceremonies,  upon  his  birthday  in 
1894.  In  the  minute  of  his  colleagues  of  the  Peabody 
Trust  after  his  death,  —  a  minute  prepared  by  Joseph 
H.  Choate,  —  occurs  the  following  passage  :  — 

"  It  may  be  said  with  truth  and  moderation,  that  the  great 
success  of  Mr.  Peabody's  intentions  for  the  amelioration  of 
the  destitution  and  sufferings  of  the  Southern  people  by 
education  has  been  largely  due  to  the  ceaseless  and  vigilant 
devotion  of  Mr.  Wintln^op,  during  these  twenty-seven  years, 
to  the  business  of  the  Trust.  Not  a  school  was  aided  but 
after  careful  consideration  of  its  merits  by  him.  Not  a  dollar 
was  expended  without  his  serious  consideration  of  the  utility 
of  the  outlay  in  the  direction  intended  by  Mr.  Peabody. 
His  lofty  character,  his  courteous  bearing,  his  uniform  kind- 
ness in  all  his  dealings  with  the  Trustees  over  whom  he  pre- 
sided, endeared  him  to  each  member  of  the  Trust  as  a  warm 
personal  friend,  and  the  light  which  his  experience  and 
knowledge  shed  upon  every  question  which  arose  for  delib- 
eration always  made  the  task  of  his  associates  an  easy  one. 
We  felt  that  whatever  he  approved,  after  the  study  and  re- 
flection which  he  insisted  upon  giving  to  every  measure  pro- 
jected, must,  of  course,  be  right.  It  was  a  very  great  thing 
for  an  institution  like  this  to  be  presided  over  by  such  a 
man,  who,  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  was  willing  to  give 
to  its  continual  service  the  best  powers  with  which  he  was 
endowed." 

In  his  own  mind,  however,  the  successful  administra- 
tion of  this  great  Fund  was  largely  due  to  others :  — 
first,  to  the  fact  that  distinguished  men  of  different 
parties,  and  from  all  sections  of  the  Union,  readily  con- 
sented to  serve  on  the  Board;    next,  that   persons   of 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  321 

mucli  experience  in  the  work  of  Education  rendered 
material  aid  in  other  ways ;  most  of  all,  to  his  having 
been  so  fortunate  as  to  secure  at  the  outset,  and  for  the 
next  twelve  years,  for  the  all-important  post  of  General 
Agent,  a  man  so  wise,  zealous,  and  untiring  as  that 
eminent  Northern  educator,  Barnas  Sears;  and  last, 
but  not  least,  to  his  having  enlisted,  as  the  fittest  succes-' 
sor  to  Dr.  Sears,  the  able  and  accomplished  Southern 
statesman  who  still  holds  that  position.^ 

[Nov.  10,  1886.]  I  enjoyed  the  Harvard  Anniversary 
celebration,  though  not  quite  so  much  as  its  predecessor  fifty 
years  ago,  when  I  was  Chief  Marshal.  Lowell's  oration  was 
able,  but  rather  long.  Creighton,  the  delegate  from  Emman- 
uel College,  was  very  happy  at  the  dinner,  where  my  own 
brief  remarks  were  well  enough,  though  the  reporters  made 
me  say  '  Alderman  Sidney '  for  Algernon  Sidney,  and 
'  George  Pickering '  for  George  Ticknor.  My  fourth  vol- 
ume has  been  well  received,  and,  with  its  predecessors,  tells 
the  story  of  my  life.  When  I  compiled  the  first  I  intended 
it  chiefly  for  distribution,  never  dreaming  that,  at  the  end  of 
five  and  thirty  years,  it  would  still  be  in  occasional  demand 
and  not  infrequently  cited.  I  have  always  regretted  it  did 
not  occur  to  me  to  furnish  an  index,  as  I  did  in  the  later 
ones.2     My  deafness  perceptibly  increases,  but  what  disturbs 

1  Hon.  J.  L.  M.  Curry,  formerly  of  Alabama,  now  of  Virginia.  Dur- 
ing his  absence  as  United  States  Minister  to  Spain,  many  of  his  duties 
were  acceptably  discharged  by  a  member  of  the  Board  to  whom  Mr. 
Winthrop  was  indebted  for  much  assistance  in  matters  of  detail  and  for 
constant  acts  of  kindness,  — Hon.  Samuel  A.  Green,  now  senior  member 
of  this  Society  in  order  of  election,  and  for  a  very  long  period  its 
Librarian. 

2  What  are  habitually  styled  Mr.  Winthrop's  "  Works  "  consist  of  four 
volumes  of  "  Addresses  and  Speeches,"  published  at  intervals  between 
1851  and  1886,  a  smaller  volume  entitled  "  Washington,  Bowdoin,  and 
Franklin,"  published  in  1876,  and  the  two  volumes  of  "  Life  and  Letters 
of  John  Winthrop,"  already  described.     In  a  separate  form  are  to  be  met 

21 


322  A  MEMOIR  OF 

me  even  more  is  an  occasional  failure  of  memory.  The  other 
day  I  caught  myself  boggling  at  a  quotation  from  Juvenal 
which  I  could  have  sworn  I  had  at  my  fingers'  ends.^ 

[Washington,  April  23,  1887.]  To-day  in  talking  over 
old  times  and  old  friends  with  Corcoran,^  who  is  now  in  his 
eighty-ninth  year,  I  classified  Calhoun  as  the  metaphysical 
statesman,  Webster  as  the  judicial  statesman,  and  Clay  as 
the  practical  statesman.  This  off-hand  characterization  might 
require  to  be  a  little  qualified  and  explained,  but  they  were 
all  three  great  men,  and  there  are  none  like  them  in  these 
days.  The  Senate  is  not  what  it  was  forty  years  ago,  and 
the  loss  is  not  merely  in  ability  but  in  dignity.  I  am  not 
sure  that  in  proportion  to  the  population  there  are  more 
blatant  mountebanks  in  this  country  than  of  old,  but  they 
certainly  seem  to  grow  more  noisy  and  mischievous  year  by 
year,  and  they  are  by  no  means  confined  to  one  particular 

with  various  early  productions  for  which  he  could  find  no  room  in  his 
first  volume,  and  a  few  later  ones  printed  after  1886.  Few  things  would 
have  gratified  him  more  could  he  have  foreseen  that,  after  his  death,  a 
distinguished  Senator  from  Massachusetts  not  of  his  way  of  thinking 
upon  most  public  questions  (George  F.  Hoar),  would  write  as  follows: 
"  No  one  who  has  to  speak  on  any  important  occasion  on  any  subject 
connected  with  American  politics,  or  with  history  or  literature,  should 
fail  to  consult  Mr.  Winthrop's  four  volumes  of  Addresses  and  Speeches. 
They  are  storehouses,  not  only  of  original  thought,  but  of  apt  quotation 
and  illustration ;  and  in  his  estimates  of  the  character  of  his  contem- 
poraries or  of  men  of  former  generations,  I  hardly  recall  an  opinion 
which  does  not  seem  to  me  wise  and  sound,  as  well  as  expressed  with 
unequalled  grace  and  eloquence.  .  .  .  There  is  no  man  left  who  possesses 
such  a  store  of  rich  and  abundant  learning,  or  such  rare  oratorical 
powers,  or  such  dignity  and  grace  of  personal  bearing." 

1  He  had  been  a  good  deal  amused  some  time  before  by  a  paragraph 
which  went  the  rounds  of  the  newspapers,  dealing  with  the  decline  of  a 
taste  for  Classical  Scholarship  in  New  England,  asserting,  probably 
with  exaggeration,  that  not  five  persons  in  Massachusetts  then  under 
twenty  years  of  age  could  quote  ten  lines  of  Juvenal,  and  that,  in  cap- 
ping Latin  verse,  "  old  Robert  C.  AVinthrop  "  was  capable  of  bearing 
down  single-handed  any  thirty  young  antagonists  (not  professional  in- 
structors) who  could  be  selected  from  Boston  and  its  neighborhood. 

2  William  W.  Corcoran,  the  banker. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  323 

party  or  section  or  class.  I  sometimes  feel  misgivings  as  to 
what  the  upshot  will  be  in  the  twentieth  century,  which  is 
now  fast  approaching. 

[June  21.]  Having  concocted  at  odd  moments  an  Ode  to 
Queen  Victoria  on  the  occasion  of  her  Jubilee,  I  hesitated 
whether  to  burn  it  or  privately  print  it  with  my  name  at- 
tached, and  was  advised  to  do  the  latter.  It  soon  found  its 
way  into  the  newspapers,  bringing  me  many  compliments, 
perhaps  perfunctory,  and  to-day  an  anonymous  letter,  evi- 
dently from  an  educated  person,  who  derides  my  poetry,  as 
was  perhaps  justifiable,  but  then  calls  me  a  '  toady ,'  which  I 
am  unwilling  to  admit.  I  acknowledge,  however,  that  in 
my  old  age  I  like  to  say  kind  things  of  people  when  I  con- 
scientiously can,  but  I  try  to  discriminate  after  a  fashion. 

Undismayed  by  this  caustic  criticism,  in  the  course 
of  the  two  following  years  he  similarly  printed  and 
distributed  among  a  limited  circle  of  friends  a  metrical 
translation  of  the  Dies  Irce,  a  brace  of  sonnets  to  George 
Washington  on  the  centennial  anniversary  of  his  in- 
auguration as  President,  and  some  verses  entitled  Lux 
Mundi.  In  an  earlier  chapter  of  this  memoir  is  in- 
cluded a  specimen  of  his  hymns,  and  I  think  it  not 
inappropriate  to  insert  here  the  ode  above  mentioned, 
dated  twenty-seven  years  later. 

Not  as  our  Empress,  do  we  come  to  greet  thee, 
August  Victoria, 
On  this  auspicious  Jubilee : 
Wide  as  Old  England's  realms  extend, 

O'er  earth  and  sea,  — 
Her  flag  in  every  clime  unfurled. 
Her  morning  drum-beat  compassing  the  world,  — 
Yet  here  her  sway  Imperial  finds  an  end. 
In  our  loved  land  of  Liberty ! 


324  A  MEMOIR   OF 

Nor  is  it  as  our  Queen,  for  us  to  hail  thee, 

Excellent  Majesty, 

On  this  auspicious  Jubilee  : 

Long,  long  ago  our  patriot  fathers  broke 

The  tie  which  bound  us  to  a  foreign  yoke, 

And  made  us  free ; 
Subjects  thenceforward  of  ourselves  alone, 
We  pay  no  homage  to  an  earthly  throne,  — 
Only  to  God  we  bend  the  knee ! 

Still,  still,  to-day,  and  here,  thou  hast  a  part, 

Illustrious  lady, 
In  every  honest  Anglo-Saxon  heart. 

Albeit  untrained  to  notes  of  loyalty : 
As  lovers  of  our  old  ancestral  race,  — 
In  reverence  for  the  goodness  and  the  grace 

Which  lend  thy  fifty  years  of  Royalty 
A  monumental  glory  on  the  Historic  page. 
Emblazoning  them  forever  as  the  Victorian  Age  ; 

For  all  the  virtue,  faith,  and  fortitude. 

The  piety  and  truth. 
Which  mark  thy  noble  womanhood, 

As  erst  thy  golden  youth,  — 
We  also  would  do  honor  to  thy  name. 
Joining  our  distant  voices  to  the  loud  acclaim 

Which  rings  o'er  earth  and  sea. 
In  attestation  of  the  just  renown 
Thy  reign  has  added  to  the  British  Crown ! 

Meanwhile  no  swelling  sounds  of  exultation 
Can  banish  from  our  memory. 
On  this  auspicious  Jubilee, 
A  saintly  figure,  standing  at  thy  side, 
The  cherished  consort  of  thy  power  and  pride. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  325 

Through  weary  years  the  subject  of  thy  tears, 

And  mourned  in  every  nation,  — 
Whose  latest  words  a  wrong  to  us  withstood, 
The  friend  of  peace,  —  Albert,  the  Wise  and  Good ! 

[Nov.  7,  1888.]  Harrison's  election  is  conceded,  an  event 
which  I  fully  expected  and  quietly  predicted.  I  think  highly 
of  him  and  of  many  others  who  agree  with  him,  but  I  regret 
the  restoration  to  power  of  the  Republican  party,  with  all  its 
sectional  bitterness  and  boastful  assumptions  and  swollen 
pension-lists.  Cleveland  is  an  able  man  who  has  done  excel- 
lent things,  but  I  often  find  his  arguments  more  ponderous 
than  persuasive.  In  dealing  with  the  Tariff,  he  seemed  to 
me  to  steer  straight  for  the  breakers,  treating  it  as  if  it  were 
a  new  question  of  which  he  was  an  original  expounder.  I 
have  at  last  managed  to  struggle  through  '  Robert  Elsmere,' 
who  seems  to  me  a  weak,  gushing  sort  of  person,  though  with 
some  good  qualities. 

It  may  be  gathered  from  the  two  preceding  sentences 
that  the  writer  was  neither  a  disciple  of  Richard  Cobden, 
nor  an  admirer  of  the  psychological  school  of  modern 
fiction.  He  believed  not  merely  in  a  tariff  for  revenue, 
but  in  a  moderate  degree  of  protection  for  domestic 
industries,  and  several  early  speeches  on  this  subject 
have  continued  to  be  quoted  as  authorities  up  to  the 
present  time.  -^  A  prodigious  reader,  he  had  little  liking 
for  novels,  often  breaking  down  in  the  middle  of  com- 

^  He  was  thought  to  have  a  knack  at  imparting  interest  to  fiscal  ques- 
tions, and  since  the  early  portion  of  this  memoir  was  in  type  I  have 
stumbled  on  a  letter  to  him,  dated  Jan.  8,  1842,  from  John  H.  Clifford, 
who  wrote :  "  I  have  just  read  aloud  to  Albert  Fearing  a  puff  of  your 
Tariff  speech  in  the  New  York  'American.'  '  A  beautiful  speech,  admira- 
ble in  matter  and  in  manner,  full  of  new,  original,  enlarged,  liberal, 
American  ideas,  —  condensed,  solid,  profound,  animated,  and  throughout 
forcibly  eloquent.'  I  believe  I  have  this  by  heart,  for  all  praise  of  you 
goes  to  my  heart." 


326  A   IVIEMOIR  OF 

parativelj  recent  ones  which  have  attracted  marked 
attention,  but  which  impressed  him  as  consisting  chiefly 
of  wearisome  conversations  full  of  what  he  was  fond  of 
calling  "  point  —  no  point."  It  was  a  pleasure  to  him  to 
read  aloud  to  members  of  his  family,  but  he  chose,  for 
the  most  part,  what  used  to  be  known  as  "  standard  " 
authors,  and  some  idea  of  what  might  be  termed  the 
archaic  character  of  his  literary  tastes  may  be  gained 
from  the  fact  that  he  considered  Walter  Scott  a  much 
preferable  poet  to  Robert  Browning.  He  held  many 
old-fashioned  views  upon  a  variety  of  subjects,  some  of 
which  were  of  a  character  to  excite  disgust  or  derision 
in  the  breast  of  any  self-respecting  "  advanced-thinker." 
For  instance,  he  believed  that  the  best  way  to  check 
crime  lies  in  the  prompt  and  effective  punishment  of 
a  convicted  criminal,  and,  though  a  tender-hearted  man, 
he  not  merely  approved  the  death-penalty,  but  consid- 
ered flogging  an  admirable  corrective  to  certain  classes 
of  offences.  ^  He  was  a  total  disbeliever  in  unrestricted 
suffrage,  preferring,  with  his  friend  Francis  Lieber,  an 
extensive  suffrage,  based  upon  property  and  education, 
within  the  gradual  reach  of  all  who  chose  strenuously  to 
apply  themselves.  He  realized,  however,  that  in  such  a 
matter  there  can  be  no  step  backward,  and  that  one  might 
as  well  try  to  lessen  the  number  of  flatulent  demagogues 
in  our  legislative  bodies,  or  of  sensational  writers  in  the 
press,  or  of  notoriety-seeking  preachers  in   the  pulpit. 

^  He  agreed  with  Charles  Sumner  in  finding  much  to  admire  in  the 
simplicity  and  common  sense  of  French  legal  procedure  and  the  operation 
of  the  French  Code.  (See  "  Life  of  Sumner,"  vol.  ii.  pp.  284-287.)  He 
did  not  claim  to  be  an  expert  on  this  subject,  but  it  often  seemed  to  him 
that  our  own  criminal  laws  aiford  too  many  loopholes  for  the  escape  of 
accused  persons,  particularly  when  they  are  supplied  with  funds. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  327 

He  believed  not  only  in  a  well-organized  militia,  but  in 
a  standing  army  large  enough  to  secure  the  vigorous 
enforcement  of  the  laws.  In  the  abstract,  he  preferred 
the  Republican  form  of  government  to  any  other,  but 
the  toppling  over  of  a  monarchy  did  not  necessarily 
inspire  him  with  unmixed  exhilaration;  he  sometimes 
doubted  whether  anything  would  be  gained  by  the 
exchange.  To  him  the  name  mattered  little,  the  essen- 
tials being,  in  his  judgment,  an  honest  and  efficient 
municipal  system  affording  clean  streets,  good  roads,  and 
adequate  protection  to  life  and  property;  a  trained 
civil,  diplomatic,  and  consular  service,  safe  from  the 
ravening  greed  of  party-hacks  and  office-seekers ;  an 
intelligent  and  systematic  effort  to  ameliorate  the  con- 
dition of  the  poorer  classes;  and  a  degree  of  personal 
liberty  not  allowed  to  degenerate  into  license.  He  was 
not  sanguine  enough  to  expect  all  this  anywhere  in 
absolute  perfection,  but  to  try  to  approximate  it  in 
different  parts  of  the  world  seemed  to  him  wiser  and 
more  practical  than  to  thrill  with  what  is  vaguely  termed 
"  the  enthusiasm  of  humanity,"  or  to  "  prate,"  as  John 
Quincy  Adams  called  it,  "about  the  Rights  of  Man." 
Next  to  an  exalted  opinion  of  himself,  the  most  sustain- 
ing reflection  to  many  a  man  is  the  firm  belief  which 
often  accompanies  it,  not  only  that  everything  is  going 
on  for  the  best  in  the  best  of  all  possible  worlds,  but 
that  his  own  country  is  by  all  odds  the  ^^lost  favored 
spot  in  the  universe  and  that  its  institutions  should 
be  unreservedly  envied  and  imitated  by  other  nations. 
If  patriotism  is  to  be  gauged  by  any  such  spread-eagle 
standard,  no  amount  of  special  pleading  could  dis- 
guise that  Mr.  Winthrop's  was  below  par.     Ardently 


328  A   MEMOIR   OF 

as  lie  loved  his  country,  he  was  far  from  considering  it 
faultless.  Preferring  it  to  any  other,  he  thought  it  not 
improbable  that  if  he  had  been  born  and  bred  in  some 
other,  he  might  have  liked  it  equally  well.  He  had  a 
very  high  opinion  of  the  average  ability  of  American 
public  men  of  all  parties,  and  a  still  higher  opinion  of 
the  capacity  and  ingenuity  of  that  composite  race,  the 
American  people ;  but  he  sometimes  wished  they 
would  not  be  so  boastful,  so  credulous,  so  sensitive  to 
the  slightest  foreign  criticism,  and  so  absorbingly  agog 
about  the  doings  —  or  alleged  misdoings  —  of  persons 
of  title  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic. 

In  1778,  our  former  President,  Thomas  L.  Winthrop, 
then  a  junior  at  Harvard,  acquired  in  that  neighborhood 
the  nickname  of  "  English  Tom,"  although  up  to  that 
time  he  had  never  been  abroad.  Forty-six  years  later, 
in  the  same  college,  his  son  Eobert  was  dubbed  by  some 
of  his  classmates  "English  Winthrop,"  although  he, 
too,  had  then  never  been  far  away  from  home.  Seventy 
years  after  the  last-named  period,  toward  the  close  of 
an  eloquent,  complimentary,  but  discriminating  tribute 
to  Mr.  Winthrop,  after  his  death,  by  the  present  able 
representative  of  a  family  in  which  the  latter  had  been 
personally  acquainted  with  four  generations  of  distin- 
guished men,  —  Mr.  Adams  took  occasion  to  express  a 
doubt  whether  so  "  essentially  patrician "  a  person 
(using  that  word  in  its  best  sense)  did  not  sometimes 
give  the  impression  of  being  a  little  out  of  place  here, 
however  useful  he  might  make  himself;  whether  he 
would  not  have  been  more  in  his  native  element  in 
England,  where  he  "  would  have  vindicated  and  justified 
an  aristocracy,  while  in  a  democracy,  even  though  born 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  329 

and  brought  up  in  it,  he  was  never  in  all  respects  fully 
at  home."  ^  The  suggestion  is  not  without  force,  but  it 
is,  I  think,  the  force  of  externals.  Thomas  L.  Winthrop, 
though  a  most  affectionate  man  at  bottom,  and  one  who 
made  great  pecuniary  sacrifices  for  some  of  his  children, 
was  so  conspicuous  an  example  of  the  dignified  and 
ceremonious  demeanor  of  the  old  school,  that  even 
after  his  son  had  been  elected  to  Congress  he  did  not 
venture  to  sit  down  in  his  father's  presence  uninvited.^ 
It  is  not,  therefore,  to  be  wondered  at  that  he  should 
have  inherited  something  of  formality  and  precision, 
and  his  native  reserve,  which  mellowed  in  old  age,  was 
intensified  by  a  shortness  of  vision  which  placed  him 
at  occasional  disadvantage  and  made  him  sometimes 
appear  cold  or  indifferent.  In  short,  he  had  a  good 
deal  of  what  is  traditionally  known  as  "the  English 
manner ;  "  but  though  much  given  to  hospitality  and  the 
society  of  cultivated  persons,  his  tastes  were  rather  those 
of  a  student  than  a  man  of  the  world.  He  disliked, 
even  with  intimates,  to  sit  long  over  wine ;  he  avoided 
public  dinners  whenever  he  could  without  giving  offence, 
and  made  excuses  for  not  joining  dinner-clubs.^  Save 
on  one  occasion  when  a  friend  took  him  to  the  Derby, 
I  doubt  if  he  ever  saw  a  race,  or  a  ball-match,  in  his  life. 

1  Tributes  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society  to  Robert  C. 
Winthrop,  pp.  36-37. 

2  Autres  temps,  autres  mceurs.  Not  only  did  the  son's  children  sit 
down  in  their  father's  presence  when  they  felt  like  it,  but  they  were 
even  tempted,  I  am  ashamed  to  say,  upon  more  than  one  occasion  to 
sit,  figuratively  speaking,  upon  him. 

8  The  only  Club  he  really  fancied  (aside,  of  course,  from  those  of 
college  days)  was  the  ancient  informal  "  Wednesday  Evening  Club  of 
1777,"  composed  of  a  limited  number  of  leading  representatives  of  differ- 
ent professions,  the  weekly  gatherings  of  which  he  from  time  to  time 
attended  for  more  than  half  a  century. 


330  A  MEMOIR  OF 

A  more  than  indifferent  horseman,  he  was  so  deplorable 
a  whist-player  that  it  was  fortunate  for  his  family  that 
he  was  principled  against  any  kind  of  stakes,  so  bad  a 
shot  that,  at  an  annual  battue  on  Naushon  Island,  he 
barely  escaped  the  ignominy  of  bringing  down  a  tame 
doe  which  had  approached  him  in  a  confiding  spirit. 
One  additional  trait  would  stamp  him  in  the  opinion 
of  many  as  thoroughly  "  un-American  "  :  he  never  put 
himself  in  the  way  of  receiving  railway-passes,  declined 
to  make  use  of  the  complimentary  ones  which  were 
often  sent  him,  and  insisted  on  travelling  at  his  own 
expense.  Worse  remains  behind.  The  lip  of  an  "  up 
to  date"  Harvard  graduate  would  curl  with  passing 
pity  for  a  bigoted  old  man  who  actually  attached  more 
importance  to  Greek  and  Latin  than  to  athletic  sports, 
who  regretted  for  youths  in  their  teens  the  sharp  transi- 
tion from  the  discipline  of  preparatory  schools  to  the 
independence  of  University  life,  and  did  not  believe 
them  to  be,  as  a  rule,  the  fittest  persons  to  select  their 
studies.  When  authoritatively  assured  by  some  of  those 
who  take  a  strange  delight  in  continually  pointing  out 
what  a  wretched  little  place,  in  their  opinion.  Harvard 
used  to  be,  and  how  no  facilities  for  obtaining  any 
thing  like  a  liberal  education  existed  there,  —  or,  in- 
deed, anywhere  in  New  England,  —  until  within  the 
last  five  and  twenty  years,  he  listened  with  his  accus- 
tomed benignity;  but  in  his  secret  soul  there  lurked 
an  obstinate  impression  that,  between  1818  and  1828, 
he  had  received  hereabouts  an  amount  of  good,  all- 
round,  practical  instruction  for  which  he  always  felt 
grateful,  which  had  been  of  the  greatest  service  to  him 
through  life,  and  Avhich  had  eventually  enabled  him  to 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  331 

be  brought  into  contact  with  much  younger  men  with- 
out suffering  from  too  painful  a  sense  of  intellectual 
inferiority.  He  even  upheld  that  system  of  committing 
to  memory  strings  of  names,  facts,  and  dates,  now 
lightly  esteemed  as  "  memorizing,*'  and  he  largely  attri- 
buted his  early  success  as  a  public  speaker  to  his  having 
been  continually  drilled,  both  at  the  Boston  Latin 
School  and  in  college,  in  learning  by  heart  and  reciting 
in  public  long  extracts  from  ancient  and  modern  speak- 
ers and  authors, — believing  that  he  had  not  only  derived 
great  benefit  from  the  criticisms  received  on  such  occa- 
sions, acquiring  at  the  same  time  ease  in  the  presence 
of  an  audience,  but  that  the  number  and  variety  of 
the  passages  thus  learned  had  afforded  him  much 
assistance  in  debate,  in  the  way  of  apt  illustration  or 
appropriate  quotation. 

In  the  course  of  a  familiar  discussion  of  men  and 
things  in  Washington  during  a  session  of  Congress 
more  than  seven  and  forty  years  ago,  Mr.  Seward  sen- 
tentiously  remarked  "Moderation  rarely  succeeds  in 
the  world,"  to  which  Mr.  Winthrop  rejoined,  "  It  may 
do  better  in  the  next,"  and  he  then  quoted  from 
Wordsworth's  Happy  Warrior,  as  the  true  idea  of  a 
statesman :  — 

**Who,  if  he  rise  to  station  of  command, 
Rises  by  open  means,  and  there  will  stand 
On  honorable  terms,  or  else  retire 
And  in  himself  possess  his  own  desire." 

Seward  took  a  long  whiff  at  his  cigar  and  said,  after 
a  pause, "  I  see  now  why  Greeley  no  longer  considers 
you    a   practical    politician."     Our   associate,  William 


332  A  MEMOIR   OF 

Everett,  in  a  clever  and  appreciative  notice  of  Mr.  Win- 
throp-^  —  worth  reading  by  any  one  interested  in  the 
subject  —  says :  — 

"  Moderation,  temperance,  self-control,  the  daily  restraint, 
whether  in  body,  mind,  or  spirit  of  passion  and  lawless  excess, 
or  indeed  of  excess  within  the  law,  —  the  constant,  supreme 
and  controlling  respect  for  order,  —  this  was  the  guiding 
principle  of  his  public  and  private  life.  He  learnt  it  from  his 
studies,  from  the  services  of  the  Episcopal  Church,  from  the 
traditions  of  his  ancestors  and  the  example  of  his  father,  from 
the  tone  and  habits  of  Boston  where  he  was  born  and  brought 
up,  from  the  character  of  Washington,  and  those  leaders  in 
his  nation  and  his  college  which  were  daily  held  up  to  him 
for  imitation,  like  John  Jay  and  John  Thornton  Kirkland. 
He  knew  that  eager,  fiery,  passionate  spirits  like  Gouverneur 
Morris  and  John  Adams,  whose  memory  he  loved  and  hon- 
ored, had  brought  suffering  to  their  friends  and  themselves 
by  their  fondness  for  extremes  and  absence  of  moderation ; 
and  he  trained  the  character  he  inherited  to  even  more  tem- 
perance and  order.  He  would  love  North  and  South  alike ; 
he  ivould  balance  the  sin  of  war  against  the  sin  of  slavery ; 
and  he  would  cling,  as  a  paramount  duty  of  that  patriotism, 
to  that  Union  which  Washington  founded  and  Webster  de- 
fended, to  the  very  increase  of  that  which  his  sainted  ances- 
tor had  founded  in  1643  among  the  four  colonies  of  New 
England." 

Assenting  as  Mr.  Winthrop  would  gratefully  have 
done  to  this  general  characterization,  he  would,  I 
feel  certain,  have  quietly  demurred  to  the  idea  that 
he  had  learned  any  of  his  habitual  moderation  from 
"  the  tone  and  habits  of  Boston."  The  following 
passage  from  President  D wight's  Travels  of  nearly  a 

^  Harvard  Graduates  Magazine,  March,  1895. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  333 

century  ago,  more  nearly  expresses  his  views  on  this 
subject :  ^  — 

"  The  people  of  Boston  are  characteristically  distinguished 
by  a  lively  imagination ;  an  ardor  easily  kindled ;  a  sensi- 
bility soon  felt  and  strongly  expressed;  a  character  more 
resembling  that  of  the  Greeks  than  of  the  Romans.  They 
admire,  where  graver  people  would  only  approve;  detest, 
where  cooler  minds  would  only  dislike;  applaud  a  per- 
formance, where  others  would  listen  in  silence ;  and  hiss, 
where  a  less  susceptible  audience  would  only  frown.  This 
character  renders  them  sometimes  more,  sometimes  less 
amiable,  usually  less  cautious;  and  often  more  exposed  to 
future  regret.  From  this  cause  their  language  is  frequently 
hyperbolical,  and  their  pictures  of  objects  in  any  way  inter- 
esting, highly  colored.  Hence  also,  their  enterprises  are 
sudden,  bold,  and  sometimes  rash.  The  tea  shipped  to  Bos- 
ton by  the  East  India  Company  was  destroyed.  At  New 
York  and  Philadelphia,  it  was  stored  (i.  e.  locked  up  from 
use).  From  the  same  source  also,  both  persons  and  things 
are  suddenly,  strongly,  and  universally,  applauded  or  cen- 
sured. Individuals  of  distinction  command  a  popularity 
which  engrosses  the  public  mind,  and  rises  to  enthusiasm. 
Their  observations,  and  their  efforts,  are  cited  with  wonder 
and  delight ;  and  such  as  do  not  join  in  the  chorus  of  ap- 
plause, incur  the  suspicion  of  being  weak,  envious,  or  malevo- 
lent. When  the  sympathetic  ardor  is  terminated,  the  persons 
who  have  received  this  homage  are,  without  any  change  of 
character,  regarded,  perhaps  through  life,  as  objects  deserv- 
ing of  no  peculiar  esteem  or  attachment." 

That  Mr.  Winthrop  should  not  merely  have  long  ago 

1  Rev.  Timothy  Dwight,  long  President  of  Yale  College,  and  a  man 
of  exceptional  powers  of  observation,  was  a  grandson  of  Jonathan 
Edwards  and  grandfather  of  the  actual  Yale  President  of  the  saftie  name. 
His  "  Travels  in  New  England  and  New  York  "  were  not  published  until 
1824,  but  were  written  much  earlier. 


334  A  MEMOIR  OF 

copied  this  extract  into  his  favorite  common-place  book, 
but  have  expressed  the  opinion  in  recent  years  that  it 
has  lost  nothing  of  its  appositeness  by  the  lapse  of  time, 
suggests  how  miserably  he  fell  short  of  ever  having  at- 
tained that  chiefest  and  choicest  attribute  of  the  typical 
Bostonian,  a  complacent  and  complete  satisfaction  with 
his  or  her  surroundings.  Nobody  could  see  much  of  him 
without  recognizing  his  deep  attachment  to  his  native 
place  and  his  pride  in  many  events  of  its  history ;  but 
this  affection,  it  must  be  confessed,  was  neither  indis- 
criminate nor  unbridled.  He  was  always  a  good  deal 
of  a  cosmopolitan,  liking  variety  and  change,  enjoying 
congenial  society  wherever  he  met  with  it,  and  by  no 
means  Linder  the  impression  that  his  own  neighborhood 
could  fairly  claim  any  approach  to  a  monopoly  of  intelli- 
gence and  cultivation.  If,  however,  there  were  moments 
when  the  local  atmosphere  seemed  to  him  a  little  narrow, 
a  little  dull,  charged  now  and  then  with  a  tendency  to 
mutual  admiration  and  to  make  much  of  small  things, 
pervaded  more  or  less  by  a  sort  of  hysteric  sentimen- 
talism  upon  public  questions  or  private  grievances,  ^ — 
he  had  at  least  the  grace  to  confine  such  indecent  criti- 
cisms to  the  bosom  of  his  family  and  cheerfully  accept 
the  situation.  Handicapped  as  he  was  throughout  the 
greater  part  of  his  life  by  very  uncertain  health,  he 
labored  under  another  disadvantage  of  which  he  was 
not  so  conscious,  the  lack  of  what  a  friend  whom  he 
much  admired,  the  late  Archbishop  Tait,  used  to  call 
"  the  sacred  principle  of  delegation,"  the  secret  of  never 
doing  what  one  can  get  equally  well  done  by  others, 
thereby  economizing  valuable  time.-^     He  had  an  old- 

1  Davidson's  "  Life  of  Tait,'*  vol.  ii.  p.  555. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  335 

fashioned  preference  for  doing  things  himself,  and,  in 
particular,  for  attending  to  his  large  correspondence 
single-handed,  rarely,  after  his  retirement  from  Con- 
gress, consenting  to  employ  an  amanuensis,  —  still  more 
rarely,  to  leave  any  communication,  however  tedious  or 
trivial,  unacknowledged,  and  even  systematically  inves- 
tigating endless  and  often  unworthy  appeals  for  charity 
from  strangers  at  a  distance.  In  one  of  his  familiar 
letters  from  Providence  to  John  Winthrop  the  elder, 
Roger  Williams  wrote  :  — 

"I  thankfully  acknowledge  your  wisdom  and  gentleness 
in  receiving  so  lovingly  my  late  rude  and  foolish  lines.  You 
bear  with  fools  gladly  because  you  are  wise." 

I  should  be  the  last  person  to  assert  that  this  "  bear- 
ing with  fools  gladly"  (by  which  expression  Roger,  I 
imagine,  had  in  view  that  patient  endurance  of  cranks 
and  bores  which  proceeds  from  innate  goodness  of  heart) 
has  been  an  unfailing  characteristic  of  Governor  Win- 
throp's  descendants,  but  in  the  subject  of  this  memoir  it 
was  exemplified  to  a  very  marked  degree,  and  the  result 
was  that,  although  he  rose  early  and  sat  up  late,  taking 
a  positive  pleasure  in  hard  work,  he  gave  up  so  much  of 
his  time  to  others  that  he  continually  had  to  postpone 
matters  in  which  he  was  personally  interested  and  never 
found  time  to  finish  several  biographical  undertakings. 
To  friendly  remonstrances  upon  this  subject  he  once 
replied,  —  and  the  answer  is  a  key  to  much  of  his 
life:  — 

The  world  is  apt  to  rate  men  according  to  what  they  have 
done  for  themselves  in  the  way  of  accomplishment  or  of 
acquisition ;  or  in  proportion  to  what  may  have  been  done  for 


336  A  MEMOIR  OF 

them  in  the  way  of  preferment  or  of  praise.  A  day  will 
come  when  men  will  be  valued  according  to  what  they  have 
done  for  others  —  for  God,  in  the  way  of  obedience  and  ado- 
ration —  and  for  their  fellow-men  in  the  daily  duties  of  life, 
and  in  promoting  the  general  welfare  of  society.  A  man  who 
shuts  himself  up  in  his  library  and  writes  books  may  secure 
for  himself  a  wider  and  longer  notoriety.  His  name  may 
be  often  met  with  in  catalogues  or  on  shelves.  But  the  man 
whose  voice  or  pen  is  ready  for  every  good  cause,  whose 
counsel  and  encouragement  are  withheld  from  no  worthy 
occasion  or  worthy  object,  and  who  seeks  to  promote  the 
good  of  his  fellow-creatures  and  the  glory  of  God,  by  his 
daily  life  and  conversation,  and  by  such  occasional  efforts  of 
the  written  or  the  spoken  word  as  fall  in  his  way,  is  not 
to  be  considered  less  entitled  to  distinction  than  a  popular 
author. 

Lahoriose  nihil  agens  was  his  not  infrequent  and  regret- 
ful description  of  himself  in  view  of  incessant  and  un- 
expected demands  upon  his  time,  but  he  was  gratified 
by  repeated  evidences  of  a  popular  appreciation  of  his 
disposition  to  oblige,  and  was  particularly  pleased 
towards  the  last  when  one  of  the  most  valued  of  his 
Brookline  neighbors  and  a  greater  sufferer  than  himself 
—  our  associate,  Theodore  Lyman  —  sent  him  from  a 
sick-room  the  cheering  message :  "  You  never  neglect 
a  duty,  and  you  never  forget  a  friend." 

[Boston,  May  21,  1889.]  There  has  grown  up  here  a  cus- 
tom of  devoting  a  good  deal  of  space  in  the  newspapers  to  the 
birthdays  of  local  celebrities  who  have  attained  the  dignity 
of  octogenarians,  and  I  have  recently  had  my  share  —  perhaps 
more  than  my  share.  Some  of  the  leading  articles  were  pleas- 
ant to  read,  in  particular,  the  one  in  the  '  Congregationalist.'  ^ 

^  It  contained  the  following  passage :  "  Mr.  Winthrop's  claim  upon 
popular  regard  is  by  no  means  wholly  in  connection  with  public  affairs 


ROBERT   C.   lYINTHROP.  337 

I  doubt,  however,  whether  the  average  reporter  knows  much, 
or  the  average  newspaper  reader  cares  much,  about  the 
events  of  my  career.  Indeed,  as  to  the  political  part  of  it, 
an  old  Whig  who  has  never  bowed  the  knee  to  Baal  has 
become  nearly  as  legendary  as  the  Megatherium.  But  now 
and  then  I  am  pleasantly  reminded  of  little  feathers  in  my 
cap  which  I  had  almost  lost  sight  of,  as  when  Bennett  Forbes, 
in  the  privately-printed  Reminiscences  I  have  just  been 
reading,  ascribes  to  me  the  passage  of  the  Resolution  which 
enabled  him  to  take  the  '  Jamestown  *  to  starving  Ireland,  or 
when,  in  the  recently  published  diary  of  Philip  Hone,  I  find 
an  enthasiastic  account  of  a  speech  of  mine  in  New  York  in 
1837.^  I  had  many  warm  friends  there  at  that  time  and  long 
afterward.  Indeed,  I  narrowly  escaped  being  a  New  Yorker, 
my  uncle  John,  the  oldest  of  my  grandfather's  children,  — 
who  took  his  degree  at  Harvard  as  long  ago  as  1770,  — having 
scandalized  his  relations  in  these  parts  by  preferring  to  pitch 
his  tent  in  New  York,  whither  he  persuaded  several  of  his 
brothers  to  follow  him.  Even  my  father  at  one  time  hesi- 
tated, and  I  have  often  speculated  on  the  difference  it  might 
have  made  to  me.  I  incline  to  think  I  might  have  liked  New 
York  as  well  —  perhaps  better ;  such  things  are  much  a 
matter  of  early  association.  Of  the  luxurious,  ultra-fashion- 
able society  which  has  developed  itself  there  since  the  war, 
I  know  little  or  nothing,  but  in  my  day  there  were  most  at- 
tractive, unpretending  people  to  be  met  with,  and  I  have  no 
doubt  that  similar  circles  still  exist.  Eighty  years  ago,  when 
I  was  born,  the  difference  between  the  two  places  was  not 
nearly  so  great  as  it  now  is.  New  York  having  become  more 

or  historical  literature.  He  has  ever  been  one  of  the  most  loyal,  humble 
and  consistent  Christian  men  among  us  —  one  never  ashamed  of  his  pro- 
fession of  faith,  or  afraid  to  speak  boldly  in  favor  of  vital  godliness. 
Men  of  all  denominations  rejoice  to  do  him  honor;  for  to  him  the  hoary 
head  is  a  crown  of  glory,  being  found  in  the  way  of  righteousness." 

1  Mr.  Hone  wrote :  "  Robert  C.  Winthrop  is  a  fine  fellow  and  a  true 
Whig.  His  speech  was  one  of  the  finest  I  ever  heard,  and  would  have 
done  credit  to  Clay  or  Webster." 

22 


338  A  MEMOIR  OF 

and  more  a  huge  metropolis,  while  Boston,  in  spite  of  its 
growth  and  many  attractions,  remains,  as  it  always  was,  dis- 
tinctly provincial. 

[Aug.  28,  1891.]  I  am  disposed  to  consider  Benjamin 
Harrison  the  ablest  off-hand  platform-speaker  now  living,  so 
far  as  I  have  any  knowledge  of  them.  Depew  seems  to  be 
little  more  than  a  humorist,  and  Gladstone,  to  my  mind,  is 
greater  in  every  other  way  than  as  an  orator.  I  have  repeat- 
edly heard  him  pour  forth  floods  of  talk  —  in  the  House  of 
Commons  and  elsewhere  —  but  while  I  was  always  interested 
and  generally  instructed,  I  failed  to  be  impressed  by  his  elo- 
quence. Nor  can  I  think  him  an  altogether  safe  political 
guide,  but  he  is  a  wonderful  man  in  many  ways  and  delight- 
ful to  meet  at  his  own  table.  ...  In  spite  of  Huxley's  at- 
tacks upon  what  he  calls  the  Miltonian  theory,  take  my  word 
for  it,  Milton  and  Moses  will  survive  Huxley  and  Darwin. 
I  have  just  read  over  again,  in  the  original  Greek,  the  twen- 
tieth chapter  of  St.  John's  Gospel,  to  me  the  most  delightful 
chapter  in  the  Bible  —  so  exquisite,  so  vivid,  so  convincing. 
I  never  read  it  without  fresh  emotion.  Nothing  but  Truth 
can  account  for  such  a  description.  Nothing  but  Truth, 
indeed,  can  account  for  the  Bible,  as  a  whole,  —  and  I  pity 
those  who  lose  their  relish  for  it  or  their  faith  in  it.^ 

At  the  time  of  his  death  he  was  in  his  sixtieth  year 
of  service  as  a  vestryman  of  Trinity  Church,  Boston,^ 

1  He  elsewhere  wrote  on  the  same  subject :  —  The  Bible  is  its  own 
best  witness.  Its  very  existence  after  so  many  ages,  its  miraculous  com- 
position by  those  inspired  men,  and  its  marvellous  preservation  from  all 
the  accidents  of  time  and  chance,  bespeak  nothing  less  than  the  hand  of 
God.  No  evolution  produced  that  volume ;  and  no  revolution  of  thought, 
or  act,  or  human  will,  can  ever  prevail  against  it.  Revisions  and  new 
versions  may  improve,  or  may  impair,  the  letter,  but  they  can  never 
change  its  essential  character.  The  Gospel  of  Jesus  Christ,  through 
which  he  brought  life  and  immortality  to  light,  like  its  Divine  Author,  is 
*'the  same  yesterday,  to-day,  and  forever." 

2  This  should  be  qualified  by  mentioning  that,  about  half  a  century 
ago,  he  was  ejected  from  office  by  what  was  then  termed  a  "  Puseyite 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  339 

but  what  is  now  technically  known  as  "  a  Churchman  " 
1  am  afraid  he  cannot  truthfully  be  stated  to  have  been 
for  the  space  of  sixty  minutes  —  for  while  he  preferred 
the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the  United  States  to 
any  other  religious  body  of  his  acquaintance,  he  was  im- 
able  to  perceive  that  it  could  justly  claim  to  be  styled 
"the  Church  of  America." 

I  am  [he  wrote  in  1848,  and  of  this  mind  he  continued  to 
the  end]  an  Episcopalian  of  the  Arnold  and  Whately  school, 
with  something  more  of  the  Paley  admixture.  I  agree  with 
Lord  Bacon  that  unity  does  not  necessarily  mean  uniformity, 
but  if  we  are  to  aim  at  Christian  unity,  I  am  not  in  favor  of 
letting  prelatical  assumption  stand  in  the  way  of  it.  I  do  not 
fancy  too  much  deference  to  the  Church  of  England,  however 
individually  worthy  of  respect  may  be  many  of  her  chief  pas- 
tors and  teachers.  We  are  not  a  branch  of  that  Church,  but 
an  independent  offshoot  from  it. 

Like  an  ancestor  of  his  in  Queen  Elizabeth's  time  he 
was  "a  zealous  favorer  of  the  Reformed  Faith/'  but 
while  glorying  in  a  Puritan  ancestry  he  did  not  share 
the  satisfaction  experienced  by  so  many  pious  souls  in 
frequently  nagging  the  Church  of  Rome,  which  he  con- 
sidered to  have  become  in  his  own  day  a  bulwark  of  law 
and  order  in  many  parts  of  Christendom.  Both  inside 
and  outside  of  his  own  communion  his  clerical  intimacies 
covered  a  wide  range :  a  Catholic  Bishop  of  Boston 
(Fitzpatrick)  who  had  been  his  schoolmate,  and  leading 
representatives  of  the  great  Evangelical  sects  of  non- 
conformists, were  his  always  welcome  guests,  while  some 
of  the  friends  upon  whose  advice  he  most  relied,  and  for 

cabal,"  composed  of  some  of  his  own  friends,  who  relented  and  let  him 
back  a  few  months  later. 


340  A  MEMOIR   OF 

whom  he  cherished  the  utmost  esteem  and  affection, 
were  Unitarian  ministers,  of  the  Conservative  wing  of 
that  denomination.  Although  he  had  no  taste  for  litera- 
ture in  which  the  odium  theologiciim  is  unpleasantly  mani- 
fest, he  endeavored  to  familiarize  himself  with  opposite 
shades  of  opinion,  holding  that  in  religious,  as  in  secu- 
lar controversies,  there  is  nothing  more  narrowing  to 
the  intellect  than  to  confine  one's  self  to  the  utter- 
ances of  writers  or  speakers  with  whom  one  is  in  sub- 
stantial agreement.  One  of  the  greatest  pleasures  of 
the  last  four  and  twenty  years  of  his  life  was  in  listen- 
ing to  the  sermons  of  Phillips  Brooks,  for  whose  charac- 
ter and  career  he  had  the  warmest  admiration,  although 
their  views  upon  most  political,  some  social,  and  even 
a  few  religious  questions,  were  by  no  means  in  har- 
mony. Aside  from  his  love  of  fine  Church  music,  he 
disliked  all  ceremonial  which  savored  of  sacerdotalism, 
yet  no  one  better  appreciated  than  he  the  self-denying, 
devoted  lives  led  by  many  of  the  Ritualist  clergy  among 
the  poor.  As  he  wrote  of  another,  he  was  emphatically 
a  man  of  "  Catholicity  and  Charity,"  God-fearing,  care- 
ful of  the  feelings  of  others ;  but  he  undoubtedly  had  his 
pet  aversions,  chief  among  which  were  positive  philoso- 
phy and  negative  religion  and  that  gradual  substitution 
of  Science  for  Faith,  which  leaves  the  latter  at  best  a 
shadowy  scheme  of  morals,  and  opens  the  way,  as  he 
believed,  to  every  variety  of  infidelity  and  charlatanry. 
So  far  back  as  1852,  in  his  address  to  the  Alumni  of 
Harvard,  he  had  said  on  this  subject :  — 

There  are  fields  enough  for  the  wildest  and  most  extrava- 
gant theorizings  without  overleaping  the  barriers  which  sepa- 
rate things  human  and  Divine.     Indeed,  I  have  often  thought 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  341 

that  modern  science  had  afforded  a  most  opportune  and  provi- 
dential safety  valve  for  the  intellectual  curiosity  and  ambition 
of  man,  at  a  moment  when  the  progress  of  education,  inven- 
tion, and  liberty  had  roused  and  stimulated  them  to  a  pitch 
of  such  unprecedented  eagerness  and  ardor.  Astronomy, 
chemistry,  and,  more  than  all,  geology,  with  their  incidental 
branches  of  study,  have  opened  an  inexhaustible  field  for 
investigation  and  speculation.  Here,  by  the  aid  of  modern 
instruments  and  modern  modes  of  analysis,  the  most  ardent 
and  earnest  spirits  may  find  ample  room  and  verge  enough 
for  their  insatiate  activity  and  audacious  enterprise,  and  may 
pursue  their  course  not  only  without  the  slightest  danger  of 
doing  mischief  to  others,  but  with  the  certainty  of  promoting 
the  great  end  of  scientific  truth. 

Let  them  lift  their  vast  reflectors  or  refractors  to  the  skies, 
and  detect  new  planets  in  their  hiding-places.  Let  them 
waylay  the  fugitive  comets  in  their  flight,  and  compel  them 
to  disclose  the  precise  periods  of  their  orbits,  and  to  give 
bonds  for  their  punctual  return.  Let  them  drag  out  reluc- 
tant satellites  from  '  their  habitual  concealments.'  Let  them 
resolve  the  unresolvable  nebulae  of  Orion  or  Andromeda. 
They  need  not  fear.  The  sky  will  not  fall,  nor  a  single  star 
be  shaken  from  its  sphere. 

Let  them  perfect  and  elaborate  their  marvellous  processes 
for  making  the  light  and  the  lightning  their  ministers,  for 
putting  '  a  pencil  of  rays '  into  the  hand  of  art,  and  provid- 
ing tongues  of  fire  for  the  communication  of  intelligence. 
Let  them  foretell  the  path  of  the  whirlwind  and  calculate 
the  orbit  of  the  storm.  Let  them  hang  out  their  gigantic 
pendulums,  and  make  the  earth  do  the  work  of  describing 
and  measuring  her  own  motions.  Let  them  annihilate  hu- 
man pain,  and  literally  '  charm  ache  with  air,  and  agony 
with  ether.''  The  blessing  of  God  will  attend  all  their  toils, 
and  the  gratitude  of  man  will  await  all  their  triumphs. 

Let  them  dig  down  into  the  bowels  of  the  earth.  Let 
them  rive  asunder  the  massive  rocks  and  unfold  the  history 


342  A  MEMOIR   OF 

of  creation  as  it  lies  written  on  the  pages  of  their  piled  up 
strata.  Let  them  gather  up  the  fossil  fragments  of  a  lost 
Fauna,  reproducing  the  ancient  forms  which  inhabited  the 
land  or  the  seas,  bringing  them  together,  bone  to  his  bone,  till 
Leviathan  and  Behemoth  stand  before  us  in  bodily  presence 
and  in  their  full  proportions,  and  we  almost  tremble  lest 
these  dry  bones  should  live  again.  Let  them  put  nature  to 
the  rack,  and  torture  her  in  all  her  forms,  to  the  betrayal  of 
her  inmost  secrets  and  confidences.  They  need  not  for- 
bear. The  foundations  of  the  round  world  have  been  laid  so 
strong  that  they  cannot  be  moved. 

But  let  them  not  think  by  searching  to  find  out  God.  Let 
them  not  dream  of  understanding  the  Almighty  to  perfec- 
tion. Let  them  not  dare  to  apply  their  tests  and  solvents, 
their  modes  of  analysis  or  their  terms  of  definition,  to  the 
secrets  of  the  spiritual  kingdom.  Let  them  spare  the  foun- 
dations of  faith.  Let  them  be  satisfied  with  what  is  revealed 
of  the  mysteries  of  the  Divine  Nature.  Let  them  not  break 
through  the  bounds  to  gaze  after  the  Invisible,  —  lest  the  day 
come  when  they  shall  be  ready  to  cry  to  the  mountains, 
Fall  on  us,  and  to  the  hills.  Cover  us !  ^ 

During  the  larger  part  of  1891  the  condition  of  his 
heart  made  him  a  great  sufferer,  but  his  health  improved 
in  the  following  winter,  and  he  was  able  in  the  spring 
of  1892  to  pay  his  accustomed  visits  to  New  York  and 
Washington.  On  his  return  he  had  hardly  established 
himself  in  Brookline  for  the  summer  when,  on  the  six- 
teenth of  June,  a  crushing  blow  fell  upon  him  in  the 
death  of  his  wife,  much  younger  than  himself,  after  a 

^  It  is  quite  enough  to  assume  [he  added  long  afterward]  that  in  the 
absence  of  more  positive  light  from  above,  the  Divine  is  not  to  set  limits 
to  the  human,  in  philosophy  and  science.  But  it  can  never  be  admitted 
that  the  human  is  to  prescribe  bounds  to  the  Divine,  —  the  finite  to  the 
Infinite !  Anything  can  be  comprehended  more  easily  than  a  limited 
Omniscience,  a  restricted  Omnipotence,  a  circumscribed  Omnipotence. 


^T.82. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  343 

short  illness.  Dependent  to  an  unusual  degree  upon  a 
cheerful  home,  it  so  happened  that  his  domestic  life  had 
been  clouded  at  intervals  by  many  sorrows,  of  which 
this  last  was  the  greatest,  in  view  of  his  age  and  infirmi- 
ties, and  the  fact  that  during  a  union  of  nearly  seven 
and  twenty  years  they  had  been  very  rarely  separated, 
her  devotion  to  him  having  been  only  exceeded  by  his 
admiration  of  her.  He  seldom  trusted  himself  to  speak 
or  write  of  this  bereavement,  but  the  spirit  of  resigna- 
tion he  tried  hard  to  exhibit  is  shown  by  the  follow- 
ing extracts  from  two  of  his  favorite  authors,  which  he 
entered  in  a  diary  soon  after  the  event :  — 

However  dark  and  profitless,  however  painful  and  weary 
existence  may  have  become ;  however  any  man,  like  Elijah, 
may  be  tempted  to  cast  himself  beneath  the  juniper  tree  and 
say,  '  It  is  enough,  now,  O  Lord  I '  —  life  is  not  done,  and  our 
Christian  character  is  not  won,  so  long  as  God  has  anything 
left  for  us  to  suffer  or  anything  left  for  us  to  do. 

F.  W.  Robertson. 

One  adequate  support     ■ 
For  the  calamities  of  mortal  life 
Exists,  one  only :  an  assured  belief 
That  the  procession  of  our  fate,  howe'er 
Sad  or  disturbed,  is  ordered  by  a  Being 
Of  infinite  benevolence  and  power. 
Whose  everlasting  purposes  embrace 
All  accidents,  converting  them  to  good. 

WOEDSWOETH. 

It  was  his  lot  to  survive  this  irreparable  loss  nearly 
two  and  a  half  years,  gradually  resuming  his  former 
occupations,  and,  to  kill  time,  inventing  new  ones,  such 
as  contributing  to  "  Scribner's  Magazine  "  a  little  article 


344  A  MEMOIR  OF 

on  the  death  of  John  Quuacy  Adams,  and  the  longer  one 
on  Webster's  methods  of  oratory  to  which  I  have  before 
alluded,  besides  revising,  adding  to,  and  privately  print- 
ing his  "  Reminiscences  of  Foreign  Travel."  For  change 
of  scene  he  passed  the  summers  of  1893  and  1894  at 
Nahant,  where  the  bracing  air  had  often  invigorated  him 
in  the  distant  past.  People  were  very  kind  in  calling 
to  see  him,  and  he  was  grateful  for  it,  but  he  bored  him- 
self extremely.  He  would  have  been  bored  anywhere. 
The  interest  in  life  had  gone  out  of  him,  —  mental 
depression  and  physical  suffering  remained.  He  missed 
more  and  more  his  early  friends.  The  last  of  them 
with  whom  he  had  been  in  the  habit  of  occasionally 
corresponding,  Hamilton  Fish,  died  in  the  summer  of 
1893. 

I  see  [wrote  Mr.  Winthrop]  a  newspaper  paragraph  to  the 
effect  that,  although  Fish  only  left  the  State  Department  in 
1877,  not  one  average  reader  in  a  hundred  could  have  told 
whether  he  was  alive  or  dead.  This  might  well  be  true  of 
me,  but  it  ought  not  to  have  been  true  of  him.  He  rendered 
important  public  services,  and  my  whole  intercourse  with  him, 
stretching  over  more  than  half  a  century,  always  renewed 
and  confirmed  my  impression  of  the  sturdy  honesty  of  his 
character.^ 

^  As  another  instance  of  the  evanescence  of  even  local  reputations,  it 
occurs  to  me  to  mention  that,  on  the  morning  after  Mr.  Winthrop's  death, 
I  was  somewhat  beset  by  reporters,  —  all  intelligent  young  men,  but 
several  of  them  a  little  in  the  dark  as  to  the  antecedents  of  the  subject  of 
their  inquiries.  "  I  believe,"  remarked  one  to  me,  "  that  I  am  accurate 
in  stating  that  Mr.  Winthrop  was  a  distinguished  past  Commander  of 
the  Grand  Army  of  the  Republic  ?  "  I  replied  that  he  could  claim  no  such 
distinction.  "  Surely,"  said  another,  "  I  am  right  in  describing  him  as 
the  chosen  co-worker  of  Charles  Sumner?"  I  gently  suggested  that 
"  political  antagonist "  would  be  a  safer  designation.  A  third  brought 
me  a  galley-proof,  with  the  conspicuous  double-leaded  head-line :  "  Death 
of  an  Old  Abolition  War-Horse !  "     This  was  cruellest  of  all. 


ROBERT   C.   WINTHROP.  345 

In  the  autumn  of  1893  he  was  well  enough  to  meet 
the  Peabody  Trustees  in  New  York,  and  afterward 
passed  a  fortnight  in  Berkshire.  In  November  he  took 
some  part  in  the  special  meeting  of  this  Society  which 
commemorated  his  friend  Francis  Parkman,  and  he  was 
present  at  the  official  reception  given  by  Dr.  Ellis  after 
our  annual  meeting  in  April,  1894,  having  in  the  pre- 
ceding month  made  a  short  address  to  the  Bible  Society, 
which  proved  to  be  the  last  of  his  public  utterances.  In 
the  summer  he  perceptibly  failed. 

I  am  told  [he  wrote  at  Nahant  on  the  23d  of  August]  that 
my  miserable  condition  is  due,  for  the  most  part,  to  my  being 
in  my  eighty-sixth  year.  I  cannot  push  back  the  dial,  but 
oh,  that  I  could  have  what  Keble  describes :  — 

*  Such  calm  old  age  as  conscience  pure 
And  self-commending  hearts  endure 
W^aiting  their  summons  to  the  sky, 
Content  to  live,  but  not  afraid  to  die.' 

I  am  harassed  by  no  twinges  of  conscience,  and  I  am  not 
afraid  to  die,  but  1  am  weary,  weary  of  the  life  I  lead.  My 
heart  is  in  such  a  state  that  for  years  I  have  not  had  a  good 
night's  rest  without  narcotics,  —  and  these  now  produce  little 
or  no  effect  upon  me.  I  sleep,  if  I  sleep  at  all,  in  a  chair,  or 
propped  up  by  pillows.  I  have  other  ailments  which  require 
the  constant  attendance  of  a  surgical  nurse.  I  am  very  deaf, 
often  depressed,  —  sometimes,  I  fear,  impatient,  —  conscious 
that  I  am  a  burden  to  my  daughter,  upon  whom  the  responsi- 
bility of  taking  care  of  me  chiefly  falls.  It  is  hard,  too,  to  be 
able  to  do  so  little  when  I  have  been  accustomed  to  do  so 
much,  and  to  feel  that  I  am  no  longer  of  the  smallest  use  in 
the  world.  There  is  nothing  left  but  to  have  faith  in  God's 
Providence  and  trust  in  Him  to  the  last.     Sursum  corda  ! 

His  strength  of  will  enabled  him  to  prepare  again  to 
meet  the  Peabody  Trustees  in  New  York  in  October,  and 


346  A  MEMOIR  OF 

it  was  only  the  day  before  his  intended  departure  that 
his  physician  forbade  the  journey.  A  few  weeks  later 
it  was  thought  prudent  to  bring  him  to  town  from 
Brookline,  though  he  seemed  in  no  immediate  danger 
and  was  able  to  come  downstairs.  Gradually,  however, 
his  mind  began  to  wander,  and  on  the  afternoon  of 
Tuesday,  November  fourteenth,  he  sat  for  the  last  time 
in  his  study  in  Marlborough  Street,^  turning  over  the 
leaves  of  his  favorite  hymn-book,  but  unable  to  collect 
his  thoughts.  That  evening  he  lost  consciousness,  pass- 
ing away,  without  apparent  suffering,  forty-eight  hours 
later. 

By  his  first  marriage  he  had  four  children,  three  sons 
and  a  daughter.  His  eldest  son  died  in  infancy ;  the 
second,  for  many  years  a  member  of  this  Society,  is  the 
compiler  of  this  memoir ;  the  youngest,  the  late  John 
Winthrop  of  Stockbridge,  sometime  a  member  of  the 
Massachusetts  Legislature  and  a  man  of  widespread 
personal  popularity,  followed  his  father  to  the  grave  in 
less  than  a  year.  He  left  also  three  grandchildren  and 
two  step-children,  —  a  son  of  his  second  wife  and  a 
daughter  of  his  third,  —  to  all  of  whom  he  was  tenderly 
attached.  In  earlier  life  he  had  looked  forward  to  being 
eventually  laid  with  his  parents,  several  of  his  brothers 
and  sisters,  and  some  earlier  generations  of  his  family, 
in  an  ancient  tomb  in  King's  Chapel  burial-ground  ;  but 
when  the  growth  of  Boston  rendered  interments  undesir- 
able in  the  heart  of  a  business  community,  he  built  a  simi- 

^  For  some  years  after  his  first  marriage  he  occupied  No.  7  Tremont 
Place,  moving  thence  to  No.  17  Summer  Street.  On  his  second  marriage 
he  migrated  to  No.  1  Pemberton  Square,  a  house  with  which  he  was  long 
associated  ;  but  for  the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life  his  winter  home  was 
No.  90  Marlborough  Street. 


ROBERT  C.   WINTHROP.  347 

lar  tomb  at  Mount  Auburn,  over  the  doorway  to  which 
was  placed  a  slab  intended  for  an  inscription  to  himself. 
Not  long  before  his  death  I  sounded  him  as  to  how  this 
should  be  worded.  "  I  leave  that  to  you,"  he  answered, 
"  but  make  it  short  and  comprehensive."  I  accordingly 
had  the  stone  cut  as  follows :  — 

ROBERT   C.    WINTHROP. 

Born  May  12,  1809. 
Died  November  16,  1894. 

eminent  as  a  scholar,  an  orator,  a  statesman, 
and  a  philanthropist,  —  above  all,  a  christian. 

This   does  not  seem  to  me  excessive,  and  I  doubt 
whether  he  could  be  better  described  in  fifteen  words. 


INDEX. 


A. 

Abbott,  Amos,  79. 

Aberdeen,  Earl  of,  64. 

Adams,  Charles  Francis,  44,  65,  76, 

141,  215,  278,  289,  295,  296,  298, 

300. 
Adams,  Charles  Francis,  Jr.,  316, 

328. 
Adams,  John,  291,  295,  332. 
Adams,  John  Qumcy,  7,  8,  21,  29, 

31,  32,  33,  36,  37,  38,  47,  48,  51, 

71,   74,  78,  81,  82,  84,  115,  295, 

300,  327. 
Agassiz,  Louis,  233,  261,  281. 
Agriculture,  20,  159. 
Aiken,  William,  279. 
Albert,  Prince,  325. 
Alexander  II.,  307. 
Alger,  William  R.,  197,  198. 
Allen,  Charles,  44,  65,  103. 
American  Academy,  300. 
Amory,  William,  261. 
Anderson,  Robert,  221. 
Andrew,  John  A.,  213,  225,  233,  270. 
*  Antislavery  Standard,'  197. 
Appleton,  Nathan,  1,  32,  85,  96,  167, 

187,  214,  223. 
Appleton,  William,  167,   187,  214, 

222,  223. 
Apthorp,  William,  6. 
Armstrong,  Samuel  T.,  20. 
Arnold,  Matthew,  313. 
Arnold,  Thomas,  339. 
Ashmun,  George,  29,  55,  56.  71,  132, 

136. 
Aspinwall,  Thomas,  261. 
Aspinwall,  William  H.,  257,  262. 
Astor,  John  Jacob,  257. 
Astor,  William  B.,  253. 
Aumale,  Due  d',  311. 


B. 

Bacon,  Lord,  329. 

Bacourt,  De,  312,  313. 

Badger,  George  E,,  29. 

Baldwin,  Roger  S.,  135. 

Baltimore  '  Patriot,'  49. 

Baltimore  '  Sun,*  145. 

Bancroft,  George,  312. 

Banks,  Nathaniel  P.,  198,  199,  200, 

202. 
Barbour,  James,  11. 
Barnard,  Daniel  D.,  33. 
Bates,  Edward,  221. 
Bates,  Isaac  C,  29. 
Bayard,  Richard  II.,  28. 
Beach,  Erasmus  D.,  202. 
Bell,  John,  212,  213. 
Bell,  Luther  V.,  190. 
Bennett,  James  G.,  249. 
Benton,   Thomas  H.,  78,  126,  129, 

134,  195. 
Berrien,  John  M.,  29,  138. 
Bible,  the,  304,  305,  338. 
Bigelow,  George  T.,  201. 
Bigelow,  Jacob,  214. 
Birney,  James  G.,  37,  76. 
Blackwood's  Magazine,  232. 
Blagden,  George  W.,  210,  261. 
Blaine,  James  G.,  72,  73,  215,  295, 

206. 
Blair,  Montgomery,  243. 
Blanchard,  Eliza  Cabot,  10,  32. 
Blanchard,  Francis,  10. 
Blatchford,  Samuel,  269. 
Bliss,  Seth,  210. 
Blomfield,  Charles  James,  64. 
Boston,  20,  140,  223,  233-234. 
Boston  <  Atlas,'  159. 
Boston  '  Commonwealth,'  150,  157. 
Boston  '  Congregationalist,'  336. 


350 


INDEX. 


Boston  'Courier,'  55,  80,  108,  148, 

159,  186,  207,  209. 
Boston  '  Daily  Advertiser,'  249-257, 

282. 
Boston  'Journal,'  58. 
Boston  Latin  School,  6, 195, 298, 331. 
Boston  Light  Infantry,  10. 
Boston  « Post,*  301. 
Boston  Provident  Association,  169, 

200,  299. 
Boston  Public  Library,  169,  200. 
Botts,  John  M.,  184. 
Boutwell,  George  S.,  145,  151. 
Bowdoin,  James,  4,  95,  294,  295. 
Bowdoin,  James,  the  younger,  5. 
Bowdoin,  James  (Winthrop),  5. 
Bowles,  Samuel,  170. 
Boyd,  Linn,  70. 
Brady,  James  T.,  253. 
Breckinridge,  John  C,  215. 
Briggs,  George  N.,  132, 133, 150, 167. 
Brooks,  Phillips,  313,  314,  340. 
Brooks,  Preston  S.,  184,  186. 
Brown,  B.  Gratz,  278,  280. 
Brown,  John,  213,  214,  254. 
Brown,  William  J.,  97,  98. 
Browning,  Robert,  326. 
Buchanan,  James,  78, 185,  186,  187, 

198,  204,  212,  215. 
Buckingham,  Joseph  T.,  55,  56. 
Burlingame,  Anson,  140,  141,  186, 

198,  202,  203,  204. 
Butler,  Arthur  P.  138,  186. 
Butler,  Benjamin  F.,  241,  252,  262, 

280. 
Butler,  Clement  M.,  133. 


Cabell,  Edward  C,  72,  80,  97. 

Cabot,  Mary  Anne,  10. 

Calhoun,   John  C,   15,  36,  44,  81, 

115,  116,  258,  259,  322. 
Cambridge  University,  288. 
Cameron,  Simon,  243. 
Campbell,  Lewis  D.,  97. 
Carlyle,  Thomas,  303. 
Carroll,  Charles,  11. 
Cary,  Shepherd,  38. 


Cass,  Lewis,  85,  126,  129,  215. 

Cavour,  211. 

Chandler,  Peleg  W.,  182,  285,  286. 

C banning,  Edward  T.,  7. 

Charity  Bureau,  200,  299. 

Charleston  '  Mercury,'  212. 

Chase,  Salmon  P.,  135,  221,  243. 

Chastellux,  Marquis  de,  4. 

Choate,  Joseph  H.,  320. 

Choate,  Rufus,  31,  87,  125,  147, 186, 

187,  208. 
Circourt,  Adolphe  de,  311. 
Clark,  John  H.,  134. 
Clarke,  J.  Freeman,  233. 
Clay,  Henry,  1,  11,  12,  17,  23,  29, 

33,  36,  37,  81,  82,  86, 109,  110,  129, 

135,  136,  137,  139,  144,  147,  148, 

287,  298,  299,  322. 
Clayton,  John  M.,  90,  93,  94,  95. 
Cleveland,  Chauncey  F.,  97,  117. 
Cleveland,  Grover,  325. 
Clifford,  John  H.,  1,  22,  150,  151, 

161,  214,  278,  325. 
Clingman,  Thomas  L.,  126. 
Cobb,  Howell,  97,  98,  99,  101,  103, 

126. 
Cobden,  Richard,  325. 
Colburn,  Warren,  6. 
Collamer,  Jacob,  75. 
Cocke,  William  M.,  71. 
'  Concordia,'  226. 
Congdon,  Charles  T.,  205. 
Conrad,  Charles  M.,  98. 
Coolidge,  Mrs.  Joseph,  291. 
Cooper,  James,  135. 
Cooper,  Peter,  201. 
Corcoran,  William  AY.,  322. 
Crawford,  George  W.,  130. 
Creighton,  Mandell,  321. 
Crittenden,  John  J.,  148,  150,  151, 

161,  184,  202,  214,  226,  228,  239. 
Crowell,  John,  97. 
Culver,  Erastus  D. ,  79. 
Curry,  J.  L.  M.,  321. 
Curtis,  Benjamin  R.,  143,  145,  198, 

214,  26L 
Curtis,  George  T.,  51,  111,  132,  149. 
Curtis,  George  W.,  258,  259. 
Cushing,  Caleb,  89,  145,  261. 


INDEX. 


351 


D. 

Daly,  Charles  P.,  257. 

Dana,  Charles  A.,  241. 

Dana,  Richard  H.,  Jr.,  140,  141. 

Darwin,  Charles,  338, 

Davis,  Henry  Winter,  241, 

Davis,  Jefferson,  138,  259,  262. 

Davis,  John,  13,  20,  29,  135,  136, 

148,  149,  161,  166. 
Davis,  John  W.,  72. 
Davis,  Thomas  Kemper,  8. 
Dayton,  William  L.,  29,  149, 186. 
Deane,  Charles,  274,  288,  316. 
Dennison,  William,  243. 
Depew,  Chauncey  M.,  238. 
Derby,  Mrs.  Richard,  96. 
Dexter,  Franklin,  147,  241. 
Dexter,  Henry,  309. 
Dickinson,  Daniel  S.,  252. 
Disraeli,  Benjamin,  303,  304. 
Dix,  John  A.,  89. 
Doty,  James  D.,  97. 
Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  40,  42, 48,  165, 

215. 
Douglass,  Frederick,  252,  263,  309, 

310. 
Downs,  Solomon  U.,  137,  138. 
Dowse,  Thomas,  164. 
Dufferin,  Marquis  of,  298. 
Dunbar,  Charles  F.,  249. 
Duncan,  James  H.,  136. 
Dwight,  Timothy,  232,  233. 

E. 

Eastburn,  John  H.,  299. 
Edwards,  Jonathan,  333. 
Edwards,  Thomas  O.,  76. 
Eliot,  Charles  W.,  295. 
Ellis,  George  E.,  316,  315. 
EUsler,  Fanny,  300. 
Emancipation,   220,   224,  229,  245, 

247,  287. 
Emerson,  Charles  Chauncy,  6,  8. 
Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  6,  171,  172, 

233,  275,  277,  303. 
Episcopal   Theological  School,  282, 

318. 
Erving,  George  William,  37. 
Evans,  George,  29. 


Evarts,  WiUiam  M.,  289,  296,  297. 

Everett,  Edward,  13,  20,  21,  22,  64, 
89,  140,  149,  156,  161,  162,  166, 
167,  180,  187,  196,  201,  209,  212, 
213,  214,  221,  225,  258,  261.  262, 
268,  303. 

Everett,  William,  331,  332. 

Ewing,  Thomas,  130,  135. 


Falkland,  Lord,  205. 

Farragut,  David  G.,  241. 

Faulkner,  Charles  J.,  222. 

Fearing,  Albert,  325. 

Felton,  Cornelius  C,  209,  223. 

Fessenden,  William  P.,  243. 

Fillmore,  Millard,  86,  126,  129,  130, 

131,  135,  150,  151,  157,  161,  185, 

187,  192,  228,  282. 
Fish,  Hamilton,  195,  344. 
Fisher,  John  Carlton,  5. 
Fitzpatrick,  John  B.,  339. 
Fletcher,  Richard,  22. 
Follett,  M.  P.,  77. 
Foot,  Solomon,  51. 
Foote,  Henry  S.,  126,  148. 
Forbes,  Archibald,  307. 
Forbes,  Robert  Bennett,  337. 
Forney,  John  W.,  252. 
Francis  Joseph  I.,  211. 
Franklin  Statue,  164,  187. 
Free-Soil   Party,  88,  105,  106,  145, 

166,  188,  189. 
Fremont,  John   C,    186,  187,  222, 

210,  241. 
Frothingham,  Nathaniel  L.,  210. 

G. 

Gales,  Joseph,  129,  300. 
Gallatin,  James,  253,  257. 
Gardiner,  William  H.,  261. 
Gardner,  Henry  J.,  198,  199. 
Gardner,  Samuel  P.,  10. 
Garfield,  James  A.,  300,  307. 
Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  252,  286. 
Giddings,  Joshua  R.,  67,  68,  70,  71, 

75,  76,  78,  79,  80,  89,  90,  93,  99, 

103,  126. 
Gladstone,  William  E.,  338. 
Goldthwaite,  George,  195. 


352 


INDEX. 


Gould,  Benjamin  A.,  6. 
Granger,  Francis,  195,  228,  268. 
Granger,  Gideon,  268. 
Grant,    Ulysses    S.,   233,   241,   266, 

278,  279,  280,  281,  300. 
Gray,  Francis  C,  149,  195. 
Gray,  John  C,  65,  157. 
Gray,  William,  261. 
Greele,  Samuel,  5. 
Greeley,  Horace,  241,  278,  279,  280, 

297,  331. 

Green,  Samuel  A.,  321. 

Greene,  Albert  C,  135. 

Greenough,  Richard  S.,  201. 

Grinnell,  Henry,  257. 

Grinnell,   Joseph,  29,    75,  79,   130, 

136,  167,  187,  214. 
Grinnell,  Moses  H.,  29. 
Grote,  George,  300. 

H. 

Hale,  Artemas,  79. 

Hale,  Charles,  182. 

Plale,  John  P.,  135,  145,  165. 

Hall,  A.  Oakey,  249. 

Hall,  J.  Prescott,  89. 

Hall,  Nathan  K.,  130. 

Hallam,  Henry,  64. 

Hallett,  Benjamin  F.,  208. 

Hamlin,  Hannibal,  243. 

Hampden,  John,  205,  300. 

Hancock,  Winfield  S.,  300,  302. 

Harrison,  Benjamin,  325,  338. 

Harrison,    William  Henry,  19,  23, 

24,  36,  89,  268. 
Hart,  Albert  B.,  77. 
Harvard  Alumni   Association,  156, 

227,  267,  298,  340. 
Harvard  Club,  180. 
Harvard  University,  7,  21,  169,  321, 

328,  330. 
Harvard  Washington  Corps,  7. 
Harvey,  Peter,  132. 
Hasty  Pudding  Club,  4. 
Haven,  Franklin,  132. 
Hawks,  Francis  L.,  145. 
Hayes,   Rutherford    B.,    296,    297, 

298,  300. 

Heard,  John  T.,  202,  203. 
Henderson,  John,  28. 


Hill,  Hamilton  A.,  306. 

Hillard,    George   S.,  182,  187,  202, 

209,  261. 
Hilliard,  Henry  W.,  97. 
History,  317,  318. 
Hoar,  E.  Rockwood,  231. 
Hoar,  George  F.,  322. 
Hoar,  Samuel,  141,  145. 
Hoffman,  Ogden,  29. 
Holland,  Sir  Henry,  311. 
Plolmes,  Isaac  E.,  29,  71,  72,  80,  97. 
Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell,  227,  233, 

234,  267,  297,  303. 
Hone,  Philip,  337. 
Hopkins,  Erastus,  141. 
Houston,  John  W.,  79,  98. 
Houston,  Samuel,  212. 
Howe,  John  W.,  97,  99. 
Howe,  Samuel  G.,  183,  184,  186. 
Hudson,  Charles,  79,  151,  167. 
Hughes,  John,  221. 
Hunt,   Washington,   79,    180,    202, 

228. 
Hunter,  Robert  M.  T.,  215. 
Huntington,  Daniel,  309. 
Huntington,  Frederick  D.,  180. 
Huxley,  Thomas,  338. 


Tngersoll,  Charles  J.,  36,  42,  47,  49. 
Ingersoll,  Joseph  R.,  51,  75. 
Irving,  Pierre,  229. 
Irving,  Washington,  229. 

J. 

Jackson,  Andrew,  11,  14,  15,  16,  17, 

190. 
Jackson,  Charles  T.,  190. 
Jackson,  Edmund,  24,  25. 
Jackson,  James,  261. 
Jay,  John,  the  elder,  232. 
Jay,  John,  the  younger,  241. 
Jay,  William,  197. 
Jefferson,  Thomas,  124,  291. 
Johnson,  Andrew,  92,  93,  96,   103, 

198,  220,  235,  239,  269,  271. 
Johnson,  Reverdy,  89. 
Jones,  John  W.,  71. 
Juvenal,  321. 


INDEX. 


353 


Keble,  John,  345. 

Kennedy,  Andrew,  38. 

Kennedy,  John  P.,  28,  29,  95,  204, 

210,  221,  312,  313. 
Ketchum,  Hiram,  14,  125,  250. 
King,  Daniel  P.,  79,  125. 
King,  James  G.,  125. 
King,  Thomas  Butler,  121. 
Kirkland,  John  Thornton,  332. 
Know  Nothing  Party,  168,  209. 

L. 

Lansdowne,  Marquis  of,  64. 
Lawrence,  Abbott,  22,  23,  24,  31, 

87,  91,  166,  180. 
Lawrence,  Amos  A.,  207. 
Lawrence,  William  Beach,  297. 
Lee,  John  C,  10. 
Lenox,  James,  201. 
Lieber,  Francis,  326. 
Lincoln,  Abraham,  51,  81,  88,  212, 

213,  215,  219,  220,  221,  222,  224, 

228,  229,  232,  235,  237,  238,  240, 
241,  242,  243,  244,  245,  257,  258, 
259,  261,  264,  265,  266. 

Lincoln,  Ezra,  170. 

Lincoln,  Levi,  27,  28,  149,  167,  186, 

229,  261. 

Long,  John  D.,  314. 
Longfellow,  Henry  W.,  233,  297. 
Loring,  Charles  G.,  156,  185,  267. 
Loring,  George  B.,  280. 
Lothrop,  Samuel  K.,  299. 
Louis  Philippe  I.,  64. 
Lowell,  James  Russell,  321. 
Lowell,  Rebecca  Russell,  10. 
Lunt,  George,  208. 
Lyman,  George  W.,  261. 
Lyman,  Theodore,  336. 
Lyons,  Lord,  222. 

M. 

Madison,  James,  11,  20,  58,  59. 
Mann,  Horace,  76,  92,  101,  125, 126, 

139,  145. 
Marcy,  William  L.,  51. 
Marsh,  George  P.,  51. 
Marshall,  Thomas  F.,  33. 


23 


Mason,  James  M.,   136,   196,   197, 

198,  215,  222. 
Massachusetts   Coalition,  141,  142, 

143,  146,  158,  163,  174. 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society,  v, 

170,  230,  315-317. 
May,  Samuel,  182. 
McClellan,  George  B.,233,  234,  235, 

236,  237,  239,  241,  243,  248,  252, 

257,  258,  260,  261,  262. 
McClelland,  Robert,  70. 
McClernand,  John  A.,  70. 
McDowell,  Irvin,  233. 
McDowell,  James,  92,  126. 
Mcllvaine,  Charles  P.,  221. 
McLean,  John,  82,  215. 
Meade,  George  G.,  267. 
Mercier,  Henri,  229. 
Merediths,  the,  194. 
Metternich,  292. 
Mignet,  64,  311. 
Miller,  Jacob  W.  29. 
Milman,  Henry  Hart,  64,  269. 
Mills,  John,  145. 
Milton,  John,  35,  104-,  338. 
Monroe,  James,  295. 
Moody,  Dwight  L.,  297. 
Morehead,  Charles  S.,  222. 
Mor^,  George,  147,  150,  157. 
Morgan,  Edwin  D.,  228. 
Morris,  Gouverneur,  332. 
Morton,  Jeremiah,  97,  104. 
Morton,  Marcus,  145,  190. 
Morton,  W.  T.  G.,  190. 
Moseley,  William  A.,  51. 
Mott,  Lucretia,  252. 
Mount  Auburn,  347. 
Music,  195,  196,  207,  297,  303. 

N. 
Nahant,  187,  344,  345. 
Napier,  Lord,  197. 
Napoleon  III.,  64. 
National  Fasts,  218,  219. 
'National  Intelligencer,'  199,  252- 

257. 
Naushon  Island,  159,  330. 
Newcastle,  Duke  of,  227. 
*  New  Englander.'  275. 
New  England  Magazine,'  10. 


354 


INDEX. 


Xew  York,  337,  338. 
N.  Y.  '  American,'  325. 
N.  Y.  'Journal  of  Commerce,'  210. 
N.  Y.  *  Herald,'  148,  150,  205. 
N.  Y.  *  Round  Table,' 266. 
N.  Y.  '  Times,'  199,  258,  260. 
N.  Y.  *  Tribune,'  205-209,  286. 
'  North  American  Review,'  10,  232. 

O. 

Overseers  of  the  Poor,  169,  170,  299. 
Owen,  Allen  F.,  97. 


Paley,  William,  305,  339. 

Palfrey,  John  G.,  67,  68-70,  71,  75, 

76,  77,  151. 
Palmerston,  Lord,  227. 
Park,  Edwards  A.,  187. 
Parker,  Francis  E.,  299. 
Parker,  Joel  (Mass.),  210. 
Parker,  Joel  (N.  J.),  257. 
Parker,  Richard  G.,  7. 
Parker,  Theodore,  141, 142,  182, 185. 
Parkman,  Francis,  345. 
Payne,  William  W.,  49,  50. 
Peabody,  Ephraim,  96,  167,  185. 
Peabody,  George,  273,  274,  275,  320. 
Peabody  Museum,  274,  318. 
Peabody  Trust,  274,  303,   318-321, 

345. 
Pearce,  James  A.,  135, 136, 165, 195, 

215. 
Peck,  Lucius  B.,  97. 
Peel,  Sir  Robert,  64. 
Peirce,  Benjamin,  208. 
Pendleton,  George  H.,  235,  241. 
Pendleton,  John  S.,  83. 
Petigru,  James  L.,  222. 
Phelps,  Royal,  257. 
Phelps,  Samuel  S.,  134,  135. 
Phi  Beta  Kappa,  7. 
Phillips,  Stephen  C,  44,  141,  145. 
Phillips,  Wendell,  182,  185,  246. 
Pierce,  Edward  L.,  55,  76. 
Pierce,  Franklin,  162,  183, 194,  195. 
Pierian  Sodality,  7. 
Pierrepont,  Edwards,  229. 
Pike,  James  S.,  108. 
Pius  IX.,  211. 


Plummer  Professorship,  169. 

Polk,  James  K.,  36,  37,  51,  84,  255. 

Pollock,  James,  51. 

Porcellian  Club,  7,  267. 

Potter,  Emery  D.,  97. 

Powers,  Hiram,  309. 

Pratt,  Thomas  G.,  137. 

Prescott,  William  H.,  197,  201,  303. 

Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  226, 

276,  282,  303. 
Purdy,  Elijah  F.,  249. 
Pusey,  Edward  B.,  300,  338. 

Q. 

Quincy,  Edmund,  8. 

Quincy,  Josiah,  6, 201, 202,  226,  234. 

R. 

Ramsay,  Alexander,  51. 

Rantoul,  Robert,  Jr.,  21,  146. 

Raymond,  Henry  J.,  269. 

Reeder,  Andrew  H.,  185. 

Reid,  Whitelaw,  241. 

Republican  Party,  181, 186, 191, 193, 
204,  212,  238,  241-246,  248,  258, 
271,  278,  296,  302,  319,  325. 

Rice,  Alexander  H.,  295. 

Rives,  William  C,  185,  210,  214. 

Robbius,  Chandler,  210,  261. 

Robertson,  Frederick  W.,  343. 

Robinson,  Charles,  185. 

Rochambeau,  Marquis  de,  311. 

Rockwell,  Julius,  136,  151,  167,  180, 
312. 

Rogers,  John  Smyth,  5. 

Rogers,  Samuel,  64. 

Root,  Joseph  A.,  102,  105. 

Russell,  Charles  Theodore,  208. 

Russell,  Earl,  227. 

Russell,  Thomas,  182. 

Rynders,  Isaiah,  249,  259. 

S. 

Saltonstall,  Leverett,  the  elder,  21, 

22,  28,  30,  31,  67. 
Sanders,  Charles,  199. 
Savage,  James,  226,  281. 
Schefeer,  Ary,  300. 
Schenck,  Robert  C,  51,  97, 


INDEX. 


355 


Scott,  Walter,  277,  326. 
Scott,   Winfield,  24,   82,   129,   136, 
150,  151,  154,  157,  158,  159,  161, 

183,  184,  215,  221,  228. 
Scribner's  Magazine,  296,  343. 
Sears,  Barnas,  303,  321. 
Seaton,  William  W.,  94. 
Sever,  James  W.,  199. 

Seward,  William  H.,  135,  136,  165, 

184,  185,  205,  211,  212,  215,  220, 
221,  222,  228,  242,  246,  261,  271, 
331. 

Shaw,  Lemuel,  21, 156. 

Shepperd,  Augustine  H.,  75. 

Sheridan,  Philip  H.,  257. 

Sherman,  William  T.,  235,  241. 

Sidney,  Algernon,  164,  321. 

Sinclair,  John,  311. 

Slavery,  61,  90,  124,  203,  211,  247, 
255,  256,  287,  319. 

SlideU,  John,  215,  222. 

Smith,  Caleb  B.,  67,  68. 

Smith,  Charles  C,  316. 

Smith,  John  Cotton,  210. 

Smith,  Joshua  B.,  286. 

Smith,  Truman,  88,  129,  135. 

Soul^,  Pierre,  138. 

Southard,  Samuel  L.,  29. 

Sparks,  Jared,  226. 

*  Spiritualism,'  305. 

Sprague,  Peleg,  214. 

Springfield  'Republican,*  157,  158. 

Stanhope,  Earl,  311. 

Stanley,  Arthur  P.,  298,  304,  311. 

Stanley,  Lord,  64. 

Stanly,  Edward,  97,  98, 109, 110, 240. 

Stanton,  Edwin  M.,  243. 

Stephens,  Alexander  H.,  64,  91,  97, 
98,  262,  299. 

Stevens,  Thaddeus,  269. 

Stevenson,  Andrew,  7. 

St.  Germans,  Earl  of,  227,  312. 

Stuart,  Gilbert,  4. 

Sullivan,  George,  5. 

Sullivan,  William,  12. 

Sumner,  Charles,  52-57,  65,  76,  80, 
88,  140,  145,  146,  147,  165,  182, 
184,  185,  186,  195,  198,  205,  212, 
215,  220,  241,  254,  261,  269,  270, 
279,  282-287,  297,  326,  344. 


T. 

Tait,  Archibald  Campbell,  334. 

Tallmadge,  Frederick  A.,  257. 

Taney,  Roger  B.,  78, 

Tappan,  Benjamin,  5. 

Tariff,  the,  325. 

Taylor,  Zachary,  50,  83,  84,  85,  86, 

87,  89,  90,  94,  98,  109,  110,  111, 

112,  113,  127,  128,  130,  132,  135, 

143,  148,  150,  152,  153,  154. 
Temple,  Elizabeth  Bowdoin,  4,  210, 

305. 
Temple,  Sir  John,  4. 
Thayer,  John  E.,  194,  268. 
Thiers,  64,  311. 
Thirlwall,  Connop,  64. 
Thompson,  Jacob,  35. 
Ticknor,  George,  214,  261,  292,  303, 

321. 
Tilden,  Samuel  J.,  295,  300. 
Tompkins,  Patrick  W.,71. 
Toombs,  Robert,  61,  64,  75,  76,  91, 

93,  94, 97,  98,   99,   100,   126,  129, 

131, 149,  220. 
Tract  Societies,  210,  223,  233. 
Tuck,  Amos,  67,  70,  71,  99. 
Tyler,  John,  30,  31,  33,  35,  36,  44, 

131,  215. 
Tyndall,  John,  281. 

U. 

'  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,'  159,  160. 
Upham,  William,  135, 


Yan  Buren,  John,  89. 
Van  Buren,  Martin,  18,  19. 
Venable,  Abraliam  W.,  127. 
Vinton,  Alexander  H.,  282. 
Vinton,  Samuel  F.,  51,  67,  72,  73, 

75,  79,  112, 113,  129. 
Von  Hoist,  Hermann,  107. 

W. 

AVade,  Benjamin  F.,  241. 
AVadsworth,  James,  229. 
Walker,  James,  181. 
Walley,  Samuel  H.,  149,  182,  183. 
Warren,  Charles  II.,  162. 


356 


INDEX. 


Warren,  John  C,  5. 

Washburn,  Emory,  166. 

Washington,  George,  15,  59,  174, 
193,  209,  308,  311,  315. 

Wayne,  James  M.,  222,  228. 

Webster,  Daniel,  8,  9,  12,  13,  16,  18, 
19,  20,  22,  23,  24,  29,  30,  32,  35, 
49.  57,  58,  64,  81,  82,  83,  86,  87, 
89,  94,  110,  111,  112,  113,  114, 
115,  116,  125,  126,  129,  130.  131, 
132,  133,  134,  135,  136,  143,  144, 
145,  148,  149,  151,  152,  153,  155, 
158,  159,  160,  161,  186,  250,  296, 
303,  322. 

Webster,  Fletcher,  111. 

Wednesday  Evening  Club  of  1777, 
329. 

Weed,  Thurlow,  136,  221,  297. 

Welles,  Laura  Derby,  96,  214,  216. 

Welling,  James  C,  249. 

Wellington,  Duke  of,  64. 

Whately,  Richard,  64,  339. 

Whig  Party,  12,  154-156,  173-177, 
337. 

'  Whig  Review,'  79. 

White,  Hugh,  75. 

White,  Hugh  L.,  19. 

White,  Richard  Grant,  233. 

Whittier,  John  G.,  171,  172,  285, 
286,  297,  315. 

Wilberforce,  Samuel,  64. 

Wilmot,  David,  43,  80,  117. 

Williams,  Roger,  300,  335. 

Wilson,  Henry,  57,  72,  125,  134, 141, 
143,  168,  170,  171,  198,  203,  204, 
212,  215,  220,  280,  281,  286,  287. 

Winsor,  Justin,  301. 

Winthrop,  Adele  G.,  268,  270,  343. 

AVinthrop,  Francis  William,  5,  210. 

Winthrop,  Frederick,  264. 

Winthrop,  Grenville  T.,  5. 

Winthrop,  John,  the  elder,  3,  230, 
231,  232,  260,  332,  335. 

Winthrop,  John,  the  younger,  4. 

Winthrop,  John  (2),  337,  346. 

Winthrop,  John  T.,  5. 

Winthrop,  Robert  C.  Extracts 
from  his  private  letters  and 
diaries,  passim.  His  preferences 
with  regard  to  this  memoir,  1-3. 


Parentage  and  early  education, 
3-6.  Career  at  Harvard,  6-8.  Le- 
gal studies,  early  occupations, 
marriage,  8-11.  Entrance  into 
politics,  early  speeches  and  politi- 
cal papers,  11-14.  Extracts  from 
speeches  in  Presidential  campaign 
of  1836, 14-19.  Service  and  Speak- 
ership in  Massachusetts  Legisla- 
ture, intimacies,  non-political  ad- 
dresses, 19-34.  Election  to  Con- 
gress and  correspondence  with 
leading  abolitionists,  24-26.  Early 
Congressional  life  and  speeches, 
26-33.  Death  of  wife,  32.  Ex- 
tract from  speech  on  Right  of 
Petition,  33-35.  Texas  Resolu- 
tion and  speech,  35,  38.  Speeches 
on  the  Oregon  Bill,  with  extracts, 
36,  38-43,  47-49.  His  amend- 
ment to  the  Oregon  Bill,  or 
"  Winthrop  proviso  "  so-called, 
43,  80.  His  "  However-bounded  " 
toast  and  reasons  therefor,  44, 
45.  His  Arbitration  Resolu- 
tions, 46.  Tariff  speeches,  20, 
31,  50,  325.  The  War  Bill  con- 
troversy and  the  bitterness  it 
engendered,  with  extract  from 
speech  at  Whig  State  Conven- 
tion of  1846,  50-57.  Extracts 
from  speeches  on  the  Mexican 
War,  with  proviso  moved  by  him, 
58-64.  First  visit  to  Europe,  64. 
His  course  at  Whig  State  Conven- 
tion of  1847,  with  extract  from 
speech  at  Faneuil  Hall,  65-67. 
Election  as  Speaker  of  the  Thir- 
tieth Congress,  with  extract  from 
speech  on  taking  the  chair,  67-74. 
Correspondence  with  John  G.  Pal- 
frey, 68-70.  Composition  of  his 
committees,  74—77.  A  local  griev- 
ance, official  precedence,  77, 
78.  Renewal  of  War  Bill  con- 
troversy, 78-80.  Social  life  in 
Washington,  28-30,  81.  Death 
of  John  Quincy  Adams,  first 
Washington  Monument  oration. 
Presidential  election  of  1848,  82- 


INDEX. 


357 


91.  Stormy  scenes  at  close  of 
Thirtieth  Congress,  91-93.  In- 
tercourse with  General  Taylor, 
93-95, 148.  Second  marriage,  95. 
Defeat  for  re-election  to  the 
Speakership,  with  numerous  ex- 
tracts, 97-101.  Importance  at- 
tached by  him  to  his  speech 
entitled  *  Personal  Vindication,' 
Feb.  21, 1850,  and  passages  there- 
from, 102-108.  His  course  on  the 
Compromise  measures  and  inter- 
course with  Webster  relating 
thereto,  109-115, 125-126.  Death 
of  Calhoun,  and  tribute  to,  115, 
116.  Extracts  from  speech  on 
the  Compromise,  INIay  8,  1850, 
116-125.  Death  of  Taylor,  and 
tribute  to,  127-129.  Relations  to 
Fillmore  and  Webster  at  this 
period,  130-133.  Succeeds  Web- 
ster in  the  Senate,  133-134.  Sena- 
torial debates  on  the  Compromise, 
with  extracts  from  correspond- 
ence relating  to  his  course,  134- 
142.  Defeat  of  Massachusetts 
Whigs,  143-146.  Candidacy  for 
Governor,  147-151,  157.  Corre- 
spondence with  Webster  in  1852, 
151-154.  Extract  from  speech 
in  support  of  General  Scott, 
154-156.  Alumni  address,  156, 
157,  340.  Death  of  Webster,  160. 
Elected  at  head  of  Scott  Electoral 
ticket  in  Massachusetts,  but  de- 
clines further  candidacies  and 
appointments,  161,  166,  167,  181, 
201,  204.  Speeches  and  addresses 
in  1854-1855,  163-165.  Know- 
Nothing  overtures,  168.  Public 
duties  not  connected  with  poli- 
tics, 169.  Declines  to  join  the  Re- 
publican party,  with  extracts  from 
his  Letter  on  Fusion,  170-181. 
Assault  on  Sumner  and  Kansas 
agitation,  182-185.  Presidential 
election  of  1856,  with  extracts 
from  his  speech  in  Faneuil  Hall, 
186-194.  Bunker  Hill  episode, 
196-198.     State  canvass  of  1857, 


199,  200.  State  canvass  of  1858, 
with  extracts  pro  and  con,  202- 
209.  Non-political  addresses,  first 
sermon,  209,  210.  Second  ab- 
sence in  Europe,  211,  212.  Presi- 
dential election  of  1860,  with 
extract  from  speech  in  Music 
Hall,  212-214.  Efforts  for  peace, 
214-216.  Illness  and  death  of 
wife,  214,  216.  Patriotic  hymn, 
217,  218.  Views  of  Civil  War, 
speech  on  Boston  Common,  sum- 
mons to  Washington,  219-222.  Ill 
health,  extracts  from  speeches,  let- 
ters and  diaries  in  1862-1863, 223- 
229.  '  Life  and  Letters  of  John 
Winthrop,'  230-232.  Extract  from 
speech  in  May,  1864,  231,  232. 
Presidential  campaign  of  1864, 
with  extracts  from  speeches  in 
support  of  General  McClellan  and 
comment  thereupon,  234-262. 
Heads  Democratic  Electoral  ticket 
in  Massachusetts,  258.  Death  of 
Everett,  262.  Utterances  in  1865, 
death  of  Lincoln,  263-268.  Third 
marriage,  268.  Johnson's  admin- 
istration, Philadelphia  Conven- 
tion, final  retirement  from  poli- 
tics, 268-273.  Intimacy  with 
George  Peabody,  third  absence 
in  Europe,  273,  274.  Plymouth 
oration,  with  extract,  275-277. 
Grant  versus  Greeley,  278-281. 
Utterances  in  1873-1874,  includ- 
ing tribute  to  Charles  Sumner 
and  comment  thereupon,  281-287. 
Fourth  absence  in  Europe,  288. 
Extract  from  his  Centennial  ora- 
tion, July  4, 1876, 289-295.  Tilden 
Letter,  295,  296,  Webster  statue 
address  in  New  York,  and  ut- 
terances in  1876-1878,  296-298. 
Tribute  to,  on  retirement  from 
Presidency  of  Boston  Provident 
Association,  299.  Centennial  of 
American  Academy,  readiness  in 
old  age,  300,  301.  Hancock  Letter, 
301,  302.  Bunker  Hill  address, 
306.     Yorktown  oration,  with  ex- 


358 


INDEX. 


tract,  305-309.  Frederick  Doug- 
lass episode,  309,  310.  Fifth  and 
last  absence  in  Europe,  311. 
Second  Washington  Monument 
oration,  311,  312,  314,  315.  Al- 
leged defiance  of  moral  sense  of 
Massachusetts,  312.  Narrow  es- 
cape from  death,  313, 314.  Retire- 
ment from  chair  of  Massachusetts 
Historical  Society,  with  matters 
incident  thereto,  315-317.  His 
services  to  Southern  education, 
318-321.  Jubilee  ode  and  other 
verses,  323-325.  His  views  on 
many  subjects,  fiscal,  literary, 
educational,  national,  and  local, 
325-328,  330,  331,  333-336.  His 
habits  and  tastes,  329,  330,  335, 
336.  His  religious  opinions,  276, 
277,  297,  304,  338-342.  Death 
of  wife,  343.  Closing  years,  last 
illness,  immediate  family,  and 
epitaph,  343-347.  Portraits,  busts, 
and  engravings  of  him,  309,  v-vi. 
His  publications,  3,  7,  13,  20,  46, 
53,  73,  85,  107,  111,  134,  139,  164, 
169,  172,  185,  200,  209,  221,  230, 


265,  274,  282,  288,  296,  298,  344. 
His  *  Works,'  so-called,  321,  322. 
His  satisfaction  with  his  political 
record,  258,  312.  Occasional  esti- 
mates of  him  by  contemporaries, 
from  1833  until  his  death,  both 
complimentary  and  otherwise,  2, 
31,  33,  36,  38,  43,  49,  50,  57-58,  99, 
108,  109,  125,  126,  127,  133,  134- 
150,  157,  158,  179,  180,  232,  249- 
257,  259-261,  262,  266,  272,  275, 
279,  285,  286,  299,  306,  310,  312, 
313,  315,  316,  320,  322,  323,  325, 
328,  331,  332,  336,  337,  344. 

Winthrop,  Theodore,  258,  259. 

Winthrop,  Thomas  L.,  4,  5,  7,  31, 
45,  328,  329. 

Winthrop,  Thomas  L.,  Jr.,  4. 

Winthrop  College,  319,  320. 

Wise,  Henry  A.,  33. 

Wood,  Fernando,  228,  249,  259. 

Woodward,  Joseph  A.,  97. 

Worcester  '  Spy,'  133. 

Wordsworth,  William,  331,  343. 

Wright,  Isaac  H.,  206,  207,  208. 

Wyman,  Jeffries,  318. 


Addresses  and  Speeches  by  Hon.  Robert  C. 
WiNTHKOP  on  Various  Occasions.  1835-1886. 
In  four  volumes.  8vo.  Little,  Brown,  &  Co., 
Boston. 

Life  axd  Letters  of  John  Winthrop,  Governor 
of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  Colony.  1588-1649. 
By  Hon.  Robert  C.  Winthrop.  In  two  vol- 
umes.   8vo.    Little,  Brown,  &  Co.,  Boston. 

Washington,  Bowdoin,  and  Franklin,  as  por- 
trayed in  Occasional  Addresses.  By  Hon. 
Robert  C.  Winthrop.  8vo.  Little,  Brown, 
&  Co.,  Boston.     1876. 

Reminiscences  of  Foreign  Travel.  A  Fragment 
of  Autobiography.  By  Robert  C.  Winthrop. 
8vo.  Privately  Printed.  John  Wilson  &  Son. 
1894. 

Tributes  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  So- 
ciety TO  Robert  C.  Winthrop.  8vo.  John 
Wilson  &  Son.     1894. 

A  Memoir  of  Robert  C.  Winthrop.  Prepared 
for  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society  by 
Robert  C.  Winthrop,  Jr.  8vo.  Little,  Brown, 
&  Co.,  Boston.     1897. 


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